
Book 'M j&5~ 
GopyrightN 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSJER 



EATING 

FOR 

HEALTH 

AND 



STRENGTH 




PORTRAIT OF THE' AUTHOR 



EATING 

for Health and Strength 



BY 

BERNARR MACFADDEN 

Author of "Macfadden's Encyclopedia of Physical 

Culture," "Strengthening the Eyes," "Making Old 

Bodies Young," "Manhood and Marriage," and 

Other Works on Health and Sex 



NEW YORK CITY 
PHYSICAL CULTURE CORPORATION 

. 119 West 40th Street 



►•* 



^ 6 



Copyright 1921 by 

PHYSICAL CULTURE CORPORATION 

New York City 



FEB 23 1922 



9a.A6M9.18 



Printed in U.S.A. 



PREFACE 

OUCCESS is the goal we all have in view. 
^ We want our lives to count for something. 
Failure is, to a certain extent, a disgrace. 

And to live the life of achievement you need 
energy, enthusiasm, ambition. 

You must have strength, vitality, endurance. 
And the buoyant spirits that make play of all 
work. 

If all this is valuable, then the power behind 
the man or the woman, in the form of food, 
assumes great importance. 

Day by day our bodies are evolved from the 
food we eat. We are what we are, because of 
food. We are hardy, vigorous and capable or 
devitalized and incompetent, depending largely 
upon the quality of nourishment that we furnish 
ourselves day by day. 

There never was a time in the history of the 
world when the human diet was worse than it is 
at the present day. 

We are starving in the midst of plenty. 

Devitalized foods of all kinds are depended 
upon for sustenance. 

People are dying, literally, by the millions, be- 

vii 



Preface 

cause of their pitiful ignorance on the subject of 
diet. 

You can starve to death while you are eating 
three "square" meals a day, and that is exactly 
the status of literally millions of people at this 
time. 

This book has been written with the aid of 
various experts for the purpose of telling the 
truth about food. It shows you, in a very defi- 
nite manner, what to eat and how to eat, in order 
to maintain your vitality at high water mark. 

The facts presented here should be taught in 
the primary schools, and the day is coming when 
such knowledge will be possessed by every grow- 
ing child. 

And I believe that this book will help to bring 
that day about. 

To insure the keeping quality of the foods pre- 
pared for the market, manufacturers often re- 
move the life-building elements. 

Devitalized foods of this character are being 
sold everywhere. You should possess the knowl- 
edge necessary to avoid products of this nature. 
The facts presented in this book will be of ines- 
timable value to you for this purpose alone. 

Learn how to eat that you may build your 
body into a masterpiece — mentally, physically 
and spiritually. 

viii 



Preface 

Make a whole man or woman of yourself. 

Proper eating will do much to bring about this 
result. In fact, without an intelligent diet, the 
most strenuous efforts towards the attainment of 
life's great rewards are often wasted. 

Learn the truth. Apply it and satisfying re- 
wards will surely come to you. 




l^yi OAAy /^Osc/*^^^ 



IX 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



CHAPTER PAGE 

Preface vii 

I. Food Science and Personal Efficiency . 1 

II. Food Chemistry 8 

III. Physiology of Nutrition 24 

IV. New Discoveries of Experimental Biology 40 
V. What to Eat 52 

VI. Balancing the Diet 72 

VII. How Much to Eat 89 

VIII. When and How to Eat 106 

IX. Food Production, Manufacturing and 

Marketing 119 

X. Home Preparation of Food . . . .136 

XI. Practical Food Economy 159 

XII. Eating for Strength and Muscular 

Energy 170 

XIII. Food and Mental Efficiency . . . .186 

XIV. Eating to Gain Weight 196 

XV. Eating to Reduce Weight 206 

XVI. Food and the Sexual Life 220 

XVII. Feeding the Baby 229 

XVIII. The Feeding of Children 240 

XIX. Eating to Prevent or Cure Disease . . 260 

XX. The Diet in Old Age 269 

xi 



EATING FOR HEALTH 
AND STRENGTH 

CHAPTER I 

Food Science and Personal Efficiency 

TT^OUR small boys once came to a green apple 
■*■ tree. 

The first boy was innocent and ignorant, and 
ate of the apples. 

The second boy had been warned by his mother, 
but the example of the first boy and the taste 
of the apples overcame the force of that warning, 
and he also ate of the apples. 

The third boy had eaten of green apples be- 
fore, and remembered the pains therefrom; but 
the taste of the apples, being an immediate 
pleasure, overcame the thought of future pain, 
and he also ate of the apples. 

The fourth boy was different. Perhaps he 
had been warned, perhaps he had observed, 
perhaps he had had experience; but he resisted 
the temptation, and so avoided future pain. 

1 



Eating for Health and Strength 

So people differ in this world as to their ability 
to resist temptation to indulgence or the erro- 
neous example of others. 

The woman who reclines among her pillows 
reading novels and eating chocolate creams is but 
another example of the small boy at the green 
apple tree. While she reads of the "lithesome 
form" and "bubbling vitality" of the heroine, and 
sighs in covetous ecstacy for a share of the ro- 
mance, she is deliberately killing her own chance 
for either joy or romance, because her indul- 
gence, whether born of ignorance or a weak will, 
is storing up an obesity that will destroy her 
beauty and shorten her life. 

All of us humans want happiness, but we differ 
as to our ideas of the way to get it. The sensual- 
ist attempts to get his happiness from the im- 
mediate stimulation of the appetites without 
forethought as to the ultimate outcome. He 
stuffs his stomach with the most stimulating and 
delectable viands, regardless of the agony of 
future dyspepsia, the pains of gout, the humilia- 
tion of obesity or the tragedy of a death before 
his time. 

The temperate man takes forethought of the 
total happiness to be had from life and, by the 
study of the laws of human health and efficiency, 
and the denial of the more immediate and in- 



Food Science and Personal Efficiency 

dulgent pleasures, he safeguards his happiness 
for the future by obedience to life's laws. 

It is for those who have the forethought, who 
wish to gain the most out of life as a whole, that 
this book is written. 

Granted that you believe the health of the 
body, the efficiency of the mind and length of 
life to be worth striving for, no argument should 
be needed to convince you of the importance of 
the subjects of food and the nutrition of the 
body. 

The business of eating is not a rare or remote 
experience in life, but it is ever with us, usually 
about three times a day. The question of eating 
concerns all, but it concerns us differently. 

It concerns the poor man chiefly from the 
economic viewpoint. Wild animals and "savage" 
men spend most of their time in food getting. 
So even in the state of civilization the average 
man spends nearly half his income — -that is, his 
working time, of which his income is the measure 
— in the getting of food, and a goodly share of 
his leisure in the eating of it. The prosperous 
man, for whom the getting of food becomes 
relatively less of a problem, just because of the 
fact of his greater wealth and leisure, is apt to 
concern himself more with the question of the 
taste and appearance of his food. 

3 



Eating for Health and Strength 

But neither rich man nor poor man, if he be 
a forethinking man, who would gain the greatest 
strength and health of body and mind and the 
maximum length of life upon this earth, can 
avoid the question of the effect of food upon the 
health, vitality and longevity. 

In this book, I shall not wholly ignore matters 
of the economy or of the taste and palatability 
of food; but the primary purpose of the work, 
and the subject to which most attention will be 
given, is the answering of questions concerning 
the relation of food to health and strength and 
the general efficiency of our lives. 

For this purpose the subject cannot be intelli- 
gently presented without some scientific discus- 
sion. The necessary scientific knowledge I shall 
strive to present as briefly as possible and with 
a view to its practical application. 

The scientific knowledge of food has made 
rapid strides in recent years, partly on account 
of the tremendous importance of food problems 
during the war. Much new knowledge has also 
been acquired recently from biological investiga- 
tions or experimenting upon animals. It is pos- 
sible that some readers may question the worth 
of food facts derived from experimenting upon 
pigeons or rats. We are not at liberty to ex- 
periment so freely upon human beings; and as 

4 



Food Science and 1 Personal Efficiency 

the laws are fundamentally the same for all or 
at least all kindred species, the student of human 
food science should welcome this knowledge 
derived from animal experimentation, but seek 
to check it by practical observation upon human 
beings. 

I give the results of the biologists who experi- 
ment on animals, because they throw interesting 
light on human food problems, but the practical 
teachings of this book are by no means wholly 
derived either from investigation of chemists or 
animal experimenters. The final and true source 
of all knowledge of human nutrition and, for 
that matter, all knowledge of human life and 
health, must be derived from human observation 
and experience. It is from this human source 
that I have derived my own fundamental views 
and practical knowledge of dietetics and health. 

The second, third and fourth chapters of the 
book will survey briefly the chemistry, the physi- 
ology and the biology of food. In these chapters 
you will find the necessary scientific groundwork 
to enable you to understand better the later dis- 
cussions. The fifth chapter considers "What to 
Eat," and treats of the nutritional values of 
various foods. Following this we consider the 
balancing of the diet, or the effect of combining 
and proportioning foods, and "How and When 

5 



Eating for Health and Strength 

to Eat." We then discuss "How Much to Eat," 
or the question of food quantity. 

The four chapters next in order will cover the 
subjects of the production, marketing and manu- 
facture of food, the preparation of food in the 
home, or practical cpokery, and the question of 
food economy or the "Cost of Living." 

Those chapters thus far enumerated will serve 
to give you a general knowledge of food science 
and the practical application to the economical 
and efficient nourishment of the body; all these 
chapters will be of equal interest and importance 
to all readers. The remaining eight chapters of 
the book are devoted to eight special health or 
personal living problems in which the reader's 
interest may vary somewhat, according to his 
own physical condition or personal needs. Thus, 
some of you want to know how to eat to gain 
weight, and others how to eat to reduce weight. 
The problem of eating for maximum physical 
strength and efficiency should interest all, and 
the similar problem of the effect of food and 
our eating habits upon mental efficiency is of 
equal importance in the world in which most men 
labor with their minds. Questions of the effect 
of food upon the sexual and procreative life, and 
problems of feeding children for health and 
growth are vital ones for individual happiness 



Food Science and Personal Efficiency 

and social welfare. The problem of the effect of 
food upon the length of life concerns or should 
concern us all, but will naturally be of more con- 
cern to those advanced in years; hence is treated 
from that viewpoint. The relation of food to 
the prevention and cure of disease is but another 
aspect of the general problem — for health is but 
the absence of disease, and disease the absence of 
health. 



CHAPTER II 

Food Chemistry 

npHE human body and the foods eaten by man 
A are of necessity composed of the same chem- 
ical elements, since the one is made from the 
other. This is strictly true if we class water as 
a food. Oxygen from the air, while necessary 
to life, is not found in the body, save in the 
form of water. The elements composing water, 
oxygen and hydrogen, are the two most abun- 
dant elements composing the living flesh. The 
next most important is carbon, which we know 
in coal and also in diamonds, though neither 
substance is used for food — which is fortunate 
as they are both expensive. The fourth im- 
portant element is nitrogen. We do not get 
it from the air, though it is there in abun- 
dance, in the elementary form. Nitrogen, com- 
bined with the three preceding elements and very 
small proportions of certain minerals, forms 
complex substances known as proteins. Protein 
in various forms and combined with from two to 
three times its weight of water, composes all liv- 
ing tissues except fat, and the mineral structure 
of the bones. 

8 



Food Chemistry 



Fat, which is merely stored fuel, is composed 
of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. The bones and 
teeth are chiefly made up of calcium phosphate, 
a combination of calcium, phosphorus and oxy- 
gen. About ten other chemical elements also 
enter into the composition of the human body 
and must, therefore, be derived from food. All 
of these are minerals, and all are present only in 
small quantities. Because of the small amount 
of these minerals needed in the life processes 
their importance was for a time overlooked. 
More recent knowledge has shown this to be a 
grave error. For illustration, iron existing in 
the human body in proportions of only one part 
in 25,000, is none the less absolutely essential to 
life, since the hemoglobin, the oxygen carrying 
substance of the red blood corpuscles, must con- 
tain iron. The list of minerals includes calcium, 
phosphorus, sodium, potassium, chlorine, iron, 
sulphur, magnesium, iodine and fluorine. 

We can not learn much of practical worth from 
the mere statement of the chemical elements 
present in the body. The reason for this is that 
few of these elements are of use to the body if 
taken in their elementary form. We can use in 
breathing the elementary oxygen of the air, but 
the body can make no use of nitrogen, even more 
abundant in the atmosphere. Carbon, iron and 

9 



Eating for Health and Strength 

sulphur (and so on through the list), are ex- 
amples of chemical elements that are of no use 
to the body in their simple uncombined form. 
Most of these food minerals cannot be utilized, 
even in their compounds, unless these mineral 
compounds or salts have previously been incor- 
porated with the more abundant organic ele- 
ments. This combination of minerals with car- 
bon, oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen, which takes 
place in plant life, makes it possible for animal 
life, including man, to exist. Without the ex- 
istence of plants all higher animal forms would 
perish. We, therefore, live on second hand food, 
which has gone through one life cycle. The 
carnivorous animals go a step further and secure 
their food elements third hand, through the 
previous life processes of plants and other 
animals. 

Man can exist either by this second hand or 
this third hand process, or a combination of the 
two. Human food, composed of the substance 
or products of plant or animal life, is generally 
classified by the chemist as "organic," as dis- 
tinguished from inorganic or mineral substance 
found in the earth. Man can utilize a few in- 
organic substances, of which air and water are 
the chief. He can also make limited uses of a 
few minerals in their inorganic form, such as 

10 



Food Chemistry 



common salt. But for the most part man de- 
pends upon organic food and can not utilize ele- 
mentary or mineral substances. 

As the various substances formed by the com- 
bination of chemical elements are exceedingly 
numerous, early food chemists attempted to 
classify them into a few groups and so simplify 
matters. The group names so chosen were 
"protein," "carbohydrates," "fat" and "ash," or 
"mineral salts." 

Protein, as already explained, is the name not 
for a single substance, but for a large group of 
chemical substances, the essential similarity of 
which is that they all contain the chemical ele- 
ment nitrogen. In the early work of food analy- 
sis no effort was made to determine the exact 
nature of these proteins. In fact, the analysis 
was usually made merely by determining the 
amount of nitrogen present and calculating from 
this the amount of protein, on the assumption 
that proteins usually contain about sixteen per 
cent of nitrogen. 

Two errors were made by the early food chem- 
ist in regard to protein. One was that of attach- 
ing undue importance to it as a food substance, 
and the other was in assuming that one protein 
was as good as another. The first assumption 
was only natural, as the body is composed chiefly 

11 



Eating for Health and Strength 

of protein; hence it seemed that protein should 
be the most valuable food, and that its use in 
larger quantities would lead to better nourish- 
ment. This proved to be an error because it was 
not fully realized that the chief function of food 
in the body was that of a fuel to produce heat 
and energy. For a rough illustration, we might 
liken the body to a boiler and engine that served 
the double purpose of heating the building and 
supplying power. The boiler and engine are 
made of iron. The fuel required is carbon 
(coal). Attempting to fire the boiler with iron 
would be absurd. Now the human boiler-engine 
can, in fact must be supplied with a limited 
quantity of the material of its construction, as 
it has the power of constructing itself in the 
growth or the "repair" of its mechanism. But 
its chief requirement is fuel for the generation 
of heat and energy. 

The second error made regarding this group 
of substances collectively known as proteins, has 
led to many serious misconceptions regarding 
food values. As large quantities of protein were 
thought to be important, lean meat was formerly 
very highly rated as a food. The vegetarians, 
chiefly because of sentimental reasons, disap- 
proved of the use of meat. But they fell into the 
grave error of assuming the need of so-called 

12 



Food Chemistry 



"meat substitutes," or vegetable foods partic- 
ularly rich in protein. We now know that this 
was a double-barrelled mistake; in the first place 
we need no meat substitutes because the meat 
diet contains entirely too much protein to begin 
with. Secondly, vegetable proteins, particularly 
those of the legumes: beans, peas, peanuts, etc., 
are decidedly inferior forms of protein and are 
only partly utilized by the living organism. This 
important subject will be considered further in 
the fourth chapter. 

The second group of food substances, chemi- 
cally considered, is carbohydrates. The chief 
carbohydrates are starches and sugars. There 
are several forms of sugar differing only slightly 
in their chemical composition. Carbohydrates 
form the bulk (sixty to eighty per cent) of all 
human diets of vegetable origin. There are no 
carbohydrates in animal foods except the sugar 
in milk. Carbohydrates are also the cheapest 
food substance. Grains are composed of from 
four-fifths to nine-tenths starch. Corn is the 
cheapest known food in the central and eastern 
United States. Wheat in the eastern United 
States costs nearly twice as much as corn and is 
still a very cheap food. Wheat at a dollar a 
bushel, if a man lived on it and ate it straight 
from the bushel, would make the cost of living 

13 



Eating for Health and Strength 

less than three cents a day. In some parts of 
the world, where corn is not grown, wheat is the 
cheapest food substance. They feed it to the 
pigs and chickens in Oregon. In China rice, and 
in India millet are the cheapest foods. In Rus- 
sia it is rye and in Germany it is potatoes. The 
potato, chemically, is practically the same as the 
grains — the difference being that it is in moist 
form, carrying about three-fourths water by 
weight, and being very similar in composition to 
a cooked cereal porridge, as boiled wheat or corn 
meal mush. 

Without the development of the grains and 
cheap roots and tubers as the dominant elements 
of the human diet, the present population of the 
world could never have existed. These foods 
must therefore form a great bulk of the total 
human bill of fare. And this involves constant 
danger of improper nutrition because carbohy- 
drates, though a good fuel substance for the 
human engine, do not supply the elements of 
the body's growth nor for its proper function. 
Starch and sugar are related forms and contain 
the same elements. In fact, sugar can be made 
from starch as is done in the case of glucose, 
which is a sugar made from corn-starch. 

The third general group of food substances is 
fat. Some fat is essential in the human diet, as 

14 



Food Chemistry 



the Germans discovered during the war. A cer- 
tain amount of fat makes the diet more palatable, 
and most of our modern cookery is based upon 
the use of fat to "enrich" other food substances. 
Yet fats and carbohydrates contain the same 
three elements: carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. 
Their sole function in the body is that of being 
oxidized, or burned in our slow physiological 
fires, to produce heat and energy. The use of 
fat from foods to make the human body fat is 
not a case of physiological use but merely a 
storing of fuel food for later use. The differ- 
ence between fat and carbohydrates is in the 
amount of oxygen present, or the degree to which 
the hydrogen and carbon have already been 
oxidized. Because the fat contains less oxygen 
it is capable of further oxidization, and hence a 
given amount of fat will create more heat and 
energy — two and a fourth times as much — as 
will starch or sugar. For this reason fat is worth 
more per pound. Oil, at a price of twenty-two 
cents a pound, is just as cheap as sugar at ten 
cents. 

In a carnivorous diet, the carbohydrates being 
absent, fat becomes the chief source of body fuel. 
Protein can also be burned, but it burns waste- 
fully, leaving an unoxidized residue that must 
be excreted from the body, chiefly through the 

15 



Eating for Health and Strength 

kidneys, a process which man is not as able to 
handle as well as the carnivorous animals. 

The remaining group of food substances have 
variously been known as ash, minerals, or mineral 
salts. Most of these salts, in order to be available 
for human nutrition, must be chemically com- 
bined with the organic food elements. Thus, 
sulphur enters into the chemical composition of 
some proteins, such as egg albumin ; phosphorus, 
on the other hand, is present in some of the fat- 
like substances of egg yolk. Calcium salts are 
a fundamental and very vital element in milk. 
The growth of the young animals, and conse- 
quent rapid bone formation, requires a large 
proportion of such bone-forming minerals. The 
fact that the calf grows faster than a child results 
from cow's milk being richer in protein and min- 
eral salts than is necessary as a human food, 
even for the young. Hence, cow's milk may be 
diluted, or may form only a portion of the food 
of the child. 

Mineral salts are present in varying quantities 
in foods of vegetable origin, but the proportion 
is greater in the leaves or other growing tissues 
than in those substances like seeds, tubers or 
pulpy roots which serve the purpose of food 
storage reservoirs in the plant's life and hence 
contain large quantities of starch or fat. Green 

16 



Food Chemistry 



leaves are especially rich in iron; spinach being 
richest of any known food in iron of a form that 
may be utilized by the human body. 

The usual tables of the chemical analysis of 
food give the percentage of protein, carbohy- 
drates, fat, mineral salts and water. The pro- 
portion of the water is, of course, a very impor- 
tant consideration when estimating the value of 
food by the pound. For illustration, fresh fruit 
such as peaches contains about eighty-five per 
cent of water and only fifteen per cent of actual 
food substance. But dried peaches contain about 
fifteen per cent of water and eighty-five per cent 
of food substance. Hence, the latter, ignoring 
the question of the superior flavor of the fresh 
fruit, would be worth nearly six times as much 
per pound. Another illustration to show the 
importance of considering the water in food, is 
that of dry versus cooked cereals. A menu giv- 
ing an item of "four ounces of cereal" if inter- 
preted as the dry cereal, would have at least four 
times the food elements than if the dish be con- 
sidered as meaning four ounces of the ordinary 
cooked cereal porridge. 

Tables of food analysis also usually have a 
column headed "calories per pound." The calory 
is a unit of measurement taken from the physicist 
and is primarily a unit of heat. If a given quan- 

17 



Eating for Health and Strength 

tity of food contains so many calories, it means 
that if burned it would give off so much heat. 
Most of our food is burned in the body; that is, 
oxidized, with the result that heat is always 
produced. A certain portion of this heat energy 
may be transformed into mechanical or muscular 
energy. But mechanical energy can not be cre- 
ated in the living body, nor in the engine cited so 
often to illustrate bodily functions, without the 
producing of considerable heat. That is why we 
get warm when we exercise. 

The use of the term "units of heat" is some- 
times misleading. Heat and temperature are 
related but different things. The thermometer 
measures units of temperature. 

A pint of water at a temperature of 100 de- 
grees is twenty temperature degrees hotter than 
a pint or a quart of water at a temperature of 
eighty degrees. The number of degrees of tem- 
perature are not affected by the amount of water. 
Heat units do consider the amount of water and 
a quart of water at a given temperature contains 
twice as many heat units as a pint of water at 
the same temperature. It also takes twice as 
many heat units to raise the quart of water a 
given number of temperature degrees, and it 
would take twice as much fuel to heat it. 

The human body is always maintained at a 

18 



Food Chemistry 



temperature very close to 98 degrees. Any de- 
parture from this temperature is a serious busi- 
ness — fever temperature rarely rises above 105 
degrees. 

The heat of the body is supplied by the oxida- 
tion or slow burning of the fuel foods. The 
amount of heat required to maintain the body at 
its normal temperature of ninety-eight degrees 
will depend on the temperature of the surround- 
ing air, the amount of clothing, and the size of 
the body which affects the amount of radiating 
surface from which heat may be lost. 

The evaporation of water absorbs heat very 
rapidly. And considerable water is constantly 
being evaporated from the moist surface of the 
lungs and from the moist skin. The over heating 
of the body is prevented by the control of the 
amount of this evaporation. On a hot day, or 
when generating extra heat by muscular exer- 
tion, a man sweats, while a dog or a chicken 
"pants" to secure this extra evaporation. The 
degree of relief from this extra evaporation will 
depend on the humidity of the atmosphere. 

The body is kept from getting too cold by the 
actual stimulation of extra oxidation, but this 
oxidation to generate extra heat seldom occurs 
with a man wearing the usual clothing and ex- 
posed to the usual temperatures. The muscular 

19 



Eating for Health and Strength 

action of heart, lungs, etc., ordinarily generates 
ample heat indoors or in hot weather, while out 
of doors in cold weather we instinctively keep the 
voluntary muscles active. Man, therefore, sel- 
dom needs extra food just to generate heat, as 
the heat produced during the muscular action is 
nearly always sufficient, and usually more than 
sufficient so that the excess must be taken care 
of by evaporation. 

The calory measures the value of the food 
from the standpoint of its power to produce heat 
and energy. It takes "calories" to keep us warm 
and to make our muscles work. Moreover, we 
measure the fat-forming tendencies of food by 
calories, because fat in the body is derived from 
elements which, if oxidized or used as body fuel, 
would create heat and energy. Bodily fat may 
be derived either from fat or from carbohydrates 
or, somewhat wastefully, from protein. 

Because the bulk of our food is utilized in 
creating heat and energy, or if taken in excess 
is stored as fat, we commonly consider the num- 
ber of calories in the diet as the unit of measure 
of the amount of the food eaten. It is a some- 
what dangerous method of food measurement, 
because it measures only one essential function 
of food. Thus out of the daily ration of two 
pounds of food, eighty to ninety per cent may be 

20 



Food Chemistry 



utilized in the body for oxidation, and hence be 
measured correctly by the number of calories, 
yet the remaining ten to twenty per cent, includ- 
ing the protein, is fully as essential to health and 
life as the more bulky fuel portion, the measure 
of which is expressed in calories. 

Since fat and carbohydrates are utilized in the 
body in almost exactly the same way, and the 
essential value of both may be measured in 
calories, it was formerly thought that the state- 
ment of the number of calories and of the amount 
of protein was sufficient to give a true concep- 
tion of the worth of a given food or of a given 
diet. By these two terms we may measure 
ninety-eight or ninety-nine per cent of all the 
weight of the food substance. But the remaining 
one or two per cent, including the mineral salts 
and the vitamines, while insignificant in quantity, 
are still just as vital to life and health as the 
more than bulky portions. We can even go 
further and state that a single mineral or a single 
vitamine, which in quantity may be less than one 
thousand of the weight of the food, is absolutely 
essential to life, and if "deficient" in a diet, its 
lack will cause quite as serious results as if the 
whole quantity of food was insufficient. 

The term "calories" is of value in considering 
food from the quantity standpoint. We can 

21 



I 

Eating for Health and Strength 

form approximate ideas of the worth of food 
per pound in the number of calories it contains. 
We can also intelligently discuss the total amount 
of food that should be eaten in terms of calories. 
But such considering of food quantity is only 
safe when the diet has first been properly selected 
and proportioned to make sure of the inclusion 
of sufficient variety and proper amount of the 
essential minor food elements. Unless these 
other factors are first considered the study of 
food in terms of "calories" is apt to prove a 
delusion and a snare. Thus "calories" alone will 
proclaim that one and a half pounds of starch 
or five-eighths of a pound of oil is a sufficient 
daily food allowance for a man. Obviously, 
neither substance, nor any combination of the 
two substances, would support life; though they 
would supply heat and energy, they would not 
prevent starvation because of lack of other food 
elements. In fact, it has been demonstrated that 
an animal will starve to death more quickly on 
such mere "fuel foods" than if undergoing a 
complete fast. The reason for this is that the 
process of digestion and the subsequent oxidation 
of the fuel food consumes the body store of these 
rarer food essentials and hence results in their 
exhaustion more quickly than when undergoing 
a complete fast. 

22 



Food Chemistry 



This old-time chemical analysis of food as 
protein, carbohydrates, fat, mineral salts, and in 
calories per pound, is still valuable information 
for those who are also informed of other and more 
recent aspects of food science. But this mere 
chemical analysis taken alone is not of much 
practical use and has doubtless often been worse 
than useless. A little knowledge is a dangerous 
thing, and what the analytical chemist can tell 
of foods by consulting his test tubes and without 
studying effects on the living body, is only a 
little of the knowledge of foods that is available 
for us today. 



CHAPTER III 

The Physiology of Nutrition 

TlROADLY considered, all physiological or 
*~* life processes relate to nutrition, and are af- 
fected, directly or remotely, by food. Digestion 
is most immediately and wholly related to food, 
since digestion is the process of Converting food 
into those substances which then become the liv- 
ing tissue, or which supply the living tissue with 
materials for its activities. A second group of 
physiological functions or activities most directly 
connected with food or nutrition, includes the 
transformation of food elements in the liver, 
the distribution of these elements of food in the 
muscles, and the elimination of waste products 
of the body through the lungs and through the 
kidneys. 

The process of digestion is primarily a chemical 
one, but there are also mental or nervous factors 
and physical factors to be considered. The 
chemical process of digestion begins in the mouth 
and continues throughout the length of the ali- 
mentary tract. 

The transformation which the food undergoes 

24 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

in the different digestive organs varies with the 
nature of the food. Thus the digestion of starch 
begins in the mouth and is checked in the stdmach, 
but is completed in the small intestine. On the 
other hand, the digestion of protein occurs chiefly 
in the stomach. Fat is digested almost wholly 
in the intestines. 

The chemical process of digestion is carried on 
by means of enzymes or ferments, secreted by 
the digestive glands. With these ferments, 
which are highly complex chemical substances, 
the digestive glands secrete simpler substances, 
the purpose of which is to give an alkaline or an 
acid reaction to the material being digested. 

The saliva or digestive juice of the mouth is 
weakly alkaline and contains a ferment known 
as ptyalin, which has the power of converting 
starch into sugar. This may be demonstrated 
by the fact that dry bread, when thoroughly 
masticated, develops a sweet taste. 

When the food passes into the stomach it meets 
the gastric secretions, the strong hydrochloric 
acid of which counteracts the alkaline effect of 
the saliva and gives the contents of the stomach 
an acid reaction. This acid, it seems, is necessary 
to enable the ferment pepsin to get in its work — 
dissolving the protein elements of our food. 
Digestion, in the stomach, is not completed, how- 

25 



Eating for Health and Strength 

ever, even for protein. The main function of 
the stomach seems to be to act as a warehouse 
to take care of our irregularly eaten food and to 
dole it out in a slow and carefully regulated 
stream to the more important digestive organ, 
the small intestine. During this period of tem- 
porary storage, a certain churning about and 
thorough intermixing of the food occurs. The 
chemical transformations, however, are of a 
preliminary nature. We are inclined to give the 
stomach more credit and attention because of its 
prominence and because when overloaded it 
makes its presence known. 

Shortly after the food passes into the small 
intestines, it encounters the very powerful diges- 
tive ferments secreted by the pancreas and also 
the bile from the liver. Other ferments are 
secreted from the walls of the intestines, the total 
effect of these secretions in the intestine being 
to give a strong alkaline reaction and to re- 
continue the digestion of both starch and protein 
as well as to commence and complete the diges- 
tion of fat. 

This process of digestion continues through- 
out the length of the small intestine which is also 
the chief organ of absorption of the digested food 
elements into the blood stream. 

Digestion is nearly completed by the time the 

26 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

stream of material reaches the colon or large 
intestine. The function of this latter organ is 
chiefly that of retaining the unabsorbed material 
or food waste. 

The changes which occur in the digestion of 
the various groups of food material are essen- 
tially as follows: Water, whether taken sepa- 
rately, or the water contained in moist food is 
absorbed without chemical change. This ab- 
sorption of water may take place in any portion 
of the alimentary tract. Water drunk between 
meals ;is absorbed directly from the stomach. 
The rate of absorption of water will depend upon 
the degree of moisture of the food, or the amount 
of water drunk with it. If the food is eaten dry, 
water will be secreted from the blood to bring to 
the food a suitable liquid condition. It was 
formerly given as a generally hygienic advice 
not to drink with meals. More recent investiga- 
tion has shown that moderate drinking with meals 
aids digestion, provided the drinking of water or 
other liquid is not for the purpose of washing 
down foods and thus preventing sufficient masti- 
cation and salivation. 

Next to water, the sugars are absorbed with 
the least digestive change. True fruit sugars 
undergo no chemical change for they exist in 
fruits in the same form as the sugar in the blood. 

27 



Eating for Health and Strength 

Cane sugar (that derived from beets is chem- 
ically the same) is a more complex substance, 
which must be broken up into the simpler sugars 
such as exist in fruits or in the blood. 

Starch is a still more complex substance, com- 
posed of the same primary chemical elements as 
the sugars. Starch is not soluble. In digestion 
it undergoes a complex process of being "hy- 
drolized," which merely means that more hydro- 
gen and oxygen, in the form of water enters 
into chemical combination with the starch and so 
changes it into sugar. There are several steps 
of this change, the intermediate products being 
gum-like substances called dextrins. This pro- 
cess of the simplification of the starch molecule 
can be partly brought about by heat. This oc- 
curs in the toasting of bread, or more completely 
in the manufacture of zwieback. Certain manu- 
factured cereals are similarly treated and are 
known as pre-digested foods. There is no evi- 
dence, however, that this partial performance of 
the natural digestive function outside the body 
is any advantage to a healthy man. 

We were formerly taught that the human 
being could not digest raw starch; a view which 
seems rather absurd as it assumes that man is 
by nature a cooking animal. The moist cooking 
of starch does not change it chemically but only 

28 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

results in the dry starch grains swelling up to 
a pasty-like mass. The result is that digestion 
may occur somewhat more rapidly, but unde- 
sirable fermentation may also occur more readily. 
Man has power to digest starch either raw or 
cooked, and difficulties which occur in its diges- 
tion are probably due to the use of too great a 
proportion of starch in the diet. 

Another artificial process of "digesting" starch 
is by means of treating it with strong acids, as 
in the manufacture of glucose from corn-starch. 
Chemically pure glucose is a wholesome product, 
for it is indeed the same sugar that occurs in 
fruits and in the blood. The commercial product 
may contain residues of chemicals used in its 
manufacture, though these should be properly 
neutralized. Moreover, the commercial glucose 
contains the gummy dextrins. The prejudice 
against glucose as food is founded upon igno- 
rance of its nature; it is just as good a food as 
ordinary starch or sugar, and these are whole- 
some food substances. The practical trouble is 
that the present-day civilized diet already con- 
tains too much food of this sort which crowds out 
other essential food elements. Hence, though 
starch, sugar, glucose, etc., are all good foods, 
their use should be discouraged as the tendency 
is to over-use them. 

29 



Eating for Health and Strength 

Though we do not list soap as an article of 
food — and only feed it to small boys who have 
been telling lies — yet a substance very akin to 
soap is found in food as an intermediate stage 
in the digestion of fat. Fat is insoluble, and 
hence cannot pass through the walls of the in- 
testine, but fat treated with alkali becomes soap 
or is saponified, and in this soluble form passes 
through the intestinal wall; then the alkali is 
removed again and the fat restored, existing in 
the blood in the form of tiny fat globules. 

The digestion of protein is a very complex 
process. Like fat, protein is not soluble, and 
hence it is broken down into its simpler ingre- 
dients known as amino-acids. There are a large 
number of these and they are not alike; the 
different combinations and proportions of these 
amino-acids account for the different kinds of 
proteins. This explains why all proteins are not 
of equal value for the nourishment of the body. 
These various amino-acids are recombined, after 
absorption, into the various proteins needed by 
the body. These may be like the proteins of the 
food, but are more apt to be entirely differ- 
ent proteins which have been made out of the 
food proteins but with the discarding of consid- 
erable portions of their substance. The amount 
of protein actually needed to nourish the adult is 

30 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

small, and that amount depends upon the nature 
of the protein in the food. Some proteins taken 
alone will not support life at all. Gelatine is one 
of these, and for this reason it was formerly 
thought to be without food value. It is now 
known that gelatine has food value when com- 
bined with other proteins which supplement the 
particular amino-acids which the gelatine lacks. 

Chemically considered, the processes of diges- 
tion seem to be exactly like similar processes 
which may be conducted by the scientist in his 
test-tubes. But into the chemistry of life pro- 
cesses a factor enters which does not exist in the 
laboratory processes. This factor is a nervous 
or mental one. We have long known that the 
sight, smell or taste of food causes the "mouth 
to water," but it is only more recently that 
scientists have discovered that the secretions of 
digestive juices are influenced in quality as well 
as quantity by such nervous or mental stimula- 
tion. 

Still more remarkable, as it at first seems, not 
only is the secretion of saliva affected in this 
manner, but the secretion of the gastric juice is 
also affected by the offering of food to the senses, 
and before such food enters the stomach. Thus, 
if meat be held up before a hungry dog, the dog's 
stomach immediately begins the secretion of 

31 



Eating for Health and Strength 

gastric juice — and a more acid juice is secreted 
than if the dog be offered bread. From such 
experiments we can reason that the entire process 
of digestion is very skillfully adapted to the 
nature and quantity of the food. Obviously, the 
appeal of food to the senses has only a prelimi- 
nary effect, and such adaptation by means of 
nerve stimuli to the secreting glands must go 
on throughout the entire process of digestion, 
as it does indeed throughout all physiological 
processes. 

The practical application of such knowledge 
would seem to argue in favor of the simplifica- 
tion of the diet and of the use of foods in their 
more elementary or natural form. How these 
physiological instincts can adapt themselves to 
the highly artificial and complicated civilized diet 
is a mystery! Indeed, they probably do not 
adapt themselves completely, which is doubtless 
one of the reasons why the highly complicated 
and over-seasoned bill of fare is not as digestible 
and wholesome as a simpler diet derived from 
natural foods. 

We are frequently told that appetizing foods 
and the enjoyment of our meals is conducive to 
good digestion and proper assimilation. This is 
unquestionably true, in so far as unpalatable food 
cloys the appetite and fails to bring forth the 

32 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

proper secretion of digestive ferments. It is also 
true that anger, intense sorrow, or other distress- 
ing emotions will check or even entirely stop the 
process of digestion. But this argument in favor 
of appetizing foods may lead to trouble, if it is 
used to encourage us in the use of too highly 
flavored or over-seasoned foods. Such foods 
over-stimulate the jaded appetite, and result in 
over-eating. Obviously, such artificial flavors, 
which disguise the true nature of the food, can 
serve no good purpose in the adaptation of the 
digestive secretions to the nature of the food. 
But the worst feature of the use of over-seasoned 
food is that the man fed upon a highly stimulat- 
ing diet loses the power to enjoy, and hence the 
power to digest simpler food. There is a very 
easy cure, however, for this condition, and that 
is genuine hunger. The over-fed gormand, who 
has lost all power to enjoy his meals, and who 
would sniff contemptuously at bread and butter, 
can very readily develop an appetite for old 
boots when a wise Providence casts him adrift 
at sea in an unprovisioned boat. 

The third factor in the process of digestion is 
a mechanical one. Our teeth are given us for the 
purpose of chewing food, but entirely too much 
of our civilized dishes have already been chewed 
by the grinding burrs of mills, or by the chemical 

33 



Eating for Health and Strength 

processing of food factories. The result is that 
these ground-up, mixed-up and pre-digested 
foods not only discourage the use of our teeth 
and the accompanying process of insalivation, 
but a mass of food enters the stomach which is 
too finely ground and too readily soluble. In 
the natural process of digestion, the digestive 
solvents gradually chip off or dissolve the ex- 
ternal portions of the food particles. But when 
food, instead of consisting of granules or solid 
particles of the natural food substance, is in a 
mushy, semi-soluble condition, the entire mass is 
attacked too rapidly by the digestive ferment, 
but the chemical process is not completed quickly 
enough. The result is that unwholesome fer- 
mentations, due to the presence of bacteria, 
occur. Such bacterial fermentation or decom- 
position may produce various toxins or poisons. 

Similar undesirable fermentations with result- 
ing developments of poisoning or auto-intoxica- 
tion may occur, merely because the mass of 
digesting food moves too slowly through the in- 
testines, or because the residue is retained too 
long in the colon. 

The remedy for both evils is to be found in the 
use of coarser and more natural foods. The 
outer coatings of grain, most notably wheat bran, 
and the fibrous portions of vegetables, particu- 

34 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

larly of leafy vegetables, contain a woody fibre 
known as cellulose. This cellulose fibre is not 
digestible and does not ferment, but passes 
through the alimentary tract unchanged. The 
presence of such fibre increases the bulk of the 
food waste, especially in the latter stages of the 
digestive process. Man was fitted by nature for 
a diet containing a considerable portion of such 
fibre, and when deprived of it, and particularly 
when all food has been finely ground or pre- 
dissolved, the result is that digestion occurs too 
quickly in the upper portion of the digestive 
canal, and the small undigested residue remaining 
fails to move along with sufficient rapidity. This 
is the explanation of the common civilized com- 
plaint of constipation, and the associated evil 
results of bacterial fermentation and auto-intoxi- 
cation. 

The functions of digestion thus far considered 
in this chapter are generally understood because 
the subject is presented in the ordinary school 
physiology. But the processes of nutrition that 
occur after the food elements have been absorbed 
into the blood are not so commonly understood. 

The function of the liver, we are told, is to 
convert the sugar, which results from the diges- 
tion of all carbohydrate foods, into a substance 
called glycogen. This material may be stored 

35 



Eating for Health and Strength 

by the liver in moderate quantities, and in this 
capacity the liver acts as a sort of temporary 
warehouse to store the fuel food as digested until 
it is required for the production of heat or ener- 
gy of the muscles. Fat, which serves the same 
ultimate use, is not stored in the liver, but, if 
taken in excess of the body's immediate power to 
consume it, must be stored as fat throughout the 
various fatty deposits of the body. Either 
sugar or fat may be oxidized to produce heat and 
energy. Moreover, when carbohydrate foods are 
eaten in excess of the body's needs, or the liver's 
capacity for temporary storage, the resulting 
blood sugar may also be converted into fat and 
stored in the fatty tissues, in the same way as 
fat derived directly from the food. 

Sugar in the blood, and hence ultimately fat, 
can also be derived from protein foods when 
these are eaten greatly in excess of our needs. 
This is true because the protein molecule con- 
tains carbon, hydrogen and oxygen, the elements 
of both sugar and fat. But the protein also con- 
tains nitrogen, and sometimes other elements 
which cannot be oxidized or burned. When 
protein is eaten in excess of the body's needs, a 
portion of it is thus wastefully used, the same as 
carbohydrates or fats, but the nitrogen is useless 
and must be excreted as a waste product. This 

36 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

excretion occurs through the kidneys in the form 
of urea. This disposition of excess protein must 
not be confused with the more normal use of pro- 
tein, which is to build up the protoplasm of active 
cells and tissues. In the case of growth, such 
protein actually becomes a part of the living 
tissue. The individual cells are constantly break- 
ing down and being replaced by others, so that 
there is a certain process of cell growth always 
going on, even in the adult. The protein that 
has gone through this cycle and become part of 
the living tissue, only later to be discarded, is 
ultimately disposed of in the same manner as the 
excess protein taken with food. 

It is because of this fact that scientists are very 
slow in finding out the true protein requirements 
of the body. They formerly assumed that the 
amount of urea excreted by the kidneys indicated 
the amount of protein that the life processes 
really demanded. Hence their surprise and 
scepticism when it was discovered a few years 
ago that a man could live, and seemingly be the 
better for it, on from one-fourth to one-half of 
the amount of protein formerly thought neces- 
sary. The scientists had been particularly pos- 
itive that the body required these larger amounts 
of protein, because, when the amount taken in 
the food was decreased to less than the accus- 

37 



Eating for Health and Strength 

tomed figure, the result was that more nitrogen 
seemed to be excreted than was being taken in 
the food. They reasoned that this nitrogen must 
come from the living tissue, and that the man 
was therefore consuming himself, and would 
ultimately waste away and die of starvation. 
The error was in the fact that the observations 
did not continue long enough. The extra nitro- 
gen being excreted was derived from a sort of 
floating surplus, and when this was disposed of 
the amount of nitrogen excreted was reduced, or, 
as the scientists say, the nitrogen balance was 
re-established, and maintained on a lower level. 

Excess protein is not only wasted in the 
sense that it is not utilized, but it wastes other 
food substances because it stimulates the rate of 
metabolism, or physiological change, and causes 
the rate of oxidation of the body to increase dur- 
ing its period of protein digestion and absorption. 
This effect of protein was only recently discov- 
ered, but it has now been shown that a man, after 
eating heavily of meat, will generate from ten to 
thirty per cent more heat for a period of six to 
eight hours after such a meal of meat than he 
would on an empty stomach. Excess protein 
therefore wastes other foods, as this extra oxida- 
tion does not serve any useful purpose. 

Some scientists still argue that there is an 

38 



The Physiology of Nutrition 

advantage to be derived in this wasteful and 
excess use of protein. These arguments, how- 
ever, seem to be based upon the natural prejudice 
in favor of the maintaining of established habits. 
By the same line of reasoning, many people 
argue that the eating of all food in excess of our 
actual needs is a good thing, as it makes us "fat 
and prosperous" with a sort of surplus bank 
account of nutriment always on hand. 

The fallacy of this view will be fully considered 
in our chapters on "How Much to Eat" and also 
in the chapter on "Eating to Reduce Weight." 



CHAPTER IV 

New Discoveries of Experimental 
Biology 

TVEOLOGY is the science of life. Very nat- 
-" urally, the subject includes physiology, and 
both subjects include chemistry. But in this 
chapter we will treat of the subject^ of human 
nutrition from what is known as the biological 
viewpoint. This particular knowledge, which is 
the newest knowledge we have in the field of food 
science, is called biological, not because the knowl- 
edge relates to life — for the older knowledge also 
related to life — but because the methods of gain- 
ing this recent knowledge have been those of 
biological research or experimentation upon 
animals. 

To our earlier knowledge of foods and nutri- 
tion, the chemists made the greater contribution. 
They analyzed foods and determined what they 
consisted of. As physiological chemists, they 
likewise determined the composition of various 
tissues, fluids, and secretions of the body. From 
these studies, there was worked out a rather 
wonderful understanding of the complex life 

40 



New Discoveries of Experimental Biology 

processes. Yet that understanding was not com- 
plete. The chemist's test-tube is, at best, a poor 
imitation of the living organ or cell, and there 
were many facts concerning the life processes 
which eluded the chemist altogether. 

Now the experimental biologist, though he 
may know chemistry, does not depend upon the 
test-tube as the chief source of his knowledge. 
Instead, he experiments on the animal. By this 
method of biological or animal experimentation 
many ver^ important facts have recently been 
discovered. 

These biological experimenters have discov- 
ered for us the existence of certain food essentials, 
sometimes called food accessories (which the 
chemists failed to discover). These substances 
are known as vitamines. They were not discov- 
ered by chemists because they exist in food in 
small quantities, and perhaps because they were 
destroyed by the chemists in the process of their 
food analysis. 

It has been known for generations that a diet 
of artificial and preserved foods, especially a 
diet lacking fresh fruit, would cause a disease 
known as scurvy. The classic remedy for scurvy 
is the juice of citrous fruits. Fresh vegetables, 
such as cabbage, potatoes and tomatoes will also 
prevent or cure the disease. In fact, any mod- 

41 



Eating foe Health and Strength 

erate amount of fresh, unheated fruit or vege- 
tables, or the use of raw milk, will prevent scurvy. 
The disease usually occurs at sea, or in prison, 
or among soldiers fed dry rations. There is no 
excuse for its existence in a population that has 
access to natural foods. 

Men subject to scurvy may have ample food 
containing sufficient carbohydrates, fats and pro- 
tein and minerals — hence, so far as the chemists 
could determine, an adequate diet; and yet the 
food lacked something or was deficient, and this 
deficiency caused the disease. Whatever was 
missing was supplied in the fresh fruit juices or 
other foods used to relieve scurvy. I cite the 
example of scurvy first, as the disease and the 
means of curing it have been longest known. 

As a matter of fact, the discovery of vitamines 
occurred through researches concerning beri-beri. 
This disease was at one time a terrible scourge 
in the Japanese navy, but existed elsewhere in 
the Orient among the poorer classes whose diet 
was simple and monotonous. It was discovered 
some years ago that the use of polished rice as a 
chief article of diet was responsible for this 
disease, and that it could be prevented by the 
use of unpolished rice, from which the natural 
bran and germ had not been removed. Here 
again, as in the case of the relief of scurvy with 

42 



New Discoveries of Experimental Biology 

orange juice, the addition of some food ingredient 
which had escaped detection by the chemists 
prevented the disease. 

Scientists found that pigeons, if fed on polished 
rice or similar denatured cereals, developed a 
condition of paralysis known as poly-neuritis — 
a disease similar to beri-beri — and that the disease 
could be prevented or cured by adding rice 
polishings to the diet. The substance added, the 
exact chemical nature of which was unknown, 
was called a vitamine. By experimenting upon 
various foods it was possible to determine what 
foods contained this vitamine, and what foods did 
not contain it. 

In the first edition of my book: "Strength from 
Eating," published in 1901, I gave an account 
of the feeding of pigeons upon a diet of pure 
starches, fat and carbohydrates. As I then re- 
ported: "These pigeons took their food regu- 
larly, but soon lost all liveliness and sat dumb 
and motionless on the bars of their cages. On 
the twenty-first day one of them had a fit, and 
both refused to eat. One died on the twent}^- 
sixth day and the other on the thirty-first day, 
both from fits. . . . The nervous system was 
most affected, resulting in a sort of paralysis." 

This experiment, reported by me several years 
before the discovery of vitamines, was evidently 

43 



Eating for Health and Strength 

a case of the poly-neuritis or paralysis now so 
commonly observed in pigeons and some other 
animals fed on denatured foods, and akin to the 
disease, beri-beri, in man. At that time I attrib- 
uted the trouble to lack of mineral salts in the 
diet, for vitamines had never been heard of. As 
far as practical results are concerned I was right, 
for whatever may be the exact chemical nature 
of vitamines, in practice they are found to be 
usually absent from diets that are also deficient 
in minerals. 

A third vitamine has been discovered by similar 
experiments. The absence of this third vitamine 
results in generally faulty nutrition, and specifi- 
cally in a disease of the eyes known as Xeroph- 
thalmia. The substance which protects against 
this disease is known as the fat soluble vitamine. 
It is abundant in the fat of milk or butter or the 
fat of egg yolk, and in the fat of animal glands, 
such as liver and kidneys. It is not found in 
vegetable fats or oils. It is found, though in less 
abundance, in the leaves of plants, presumably 
associated with the green coloring matter. The 
cow gets her fat-soluble vitamine from the green 
grass she eats ; and the more green grass she eats, 
the yellower the butter — a seeming scientific veri- 
fication of our notion that yellow butter is the 
best butter. Obviously, the kind that is yellowed 

44 



New Discoveries of Experimental Biology 

with artificial dyes does not count in this scale 
of quality. 

I have mentioned three vitamines, the absence 
of which from the diet causes the three diseases: 
scurvy, beri-beri and this eye disease with the 
unpronounceable name. It is not that these 
particular diseases are of great importance, for 
most of us have never heard of them, but the 
discovery of vitamines is important as a warning 
against the possibilities of the diet being defici- 
ent in small amounts of food essentials, the lack 
of which may result in faulty nutrition, or per- 
haps cause diseases, or make us susceptible to 
diseases which we have hitherto attributed to 
other causes. 

It is important, also, for us to realize that 
the mere chemical analysis of food does not tell 
the whole truth about foods. The discovery of 
the vitamines has indeed been a great stimulus 
to research in all phases of nutrition. Previous 
to this event, those who had studied food chem- 
istry and could tell the percentages of carbohy- 
drates, protein and fat, and the number of cal- 
ories per pound thought they knew all there 
was to know upon the subject. Those of us who 
had studied the food question from a more prac- 
tical, human standpoint had observed much evi- 
dence of the superiority of natural foods. The 

45 



Eating for Health and Strength 

discovery of the vitamines backs, with scientific 
fact and theory, these more practical human 
observations. 

The following account of an experiment in 
the feeding of rats will serve to show the method 
of these biological researches in food science. 
Rats were fed from weaning time on, exclusively 
upon a diet consisting of — 

Per cent 

Bolted wheat flour 20 

Degerminated cornmeal 10 

Cooked and dried potato 30 

Peas 10 

Navy beans 10 

Beets 5 

Turnips 5 

Cooked and dried beefsteak 10 

This diet affords a sufficient variety of food and, 
for the rats at least, was entirely palatable. As 
far as chemical analysis can show, the diet seems 
to be nutritious and well balanced. Note that 
it is not exclusively vegetarian, but contains ten 
per cent of beef by dry weight. Since beef is 
about sixty per cent water, this would mean a 
considerably larger proportion, by weight, of 
fresh meat. From this proportion of meat, and 
the peas and beans, the rats unquestionably 
would derive sufficient protein. In short, accord- 
ing to the old ideas of food chemistry, this would 
seem to be a suitable diet for the growth and 

46 



New Discoveries of Experimental Biology 

sustenance of rats, which are omnivorous creat- 
ures whose nutritional needs are very similar to 
those of man. 

Yet rats fed on the above diet did not thrive. 
In fact, they were barely able to maintain life at 
all and never grew to more than two-thirds their 
normal size. Even this growth was slow, and 
before the rats were one-quarter through the 
normal life-span of the species, these individuals 
were rough-looking and thin-haired and had all 
appearance of extreme old age. Such rats pro- 
duced but few, if any young, and never succeeded 
in keeping these alive through the nursing period. 

But when there was added to this diet about 
ten per cent of milk (by dry weight) the entire 
results were changed. This addition of milk 
makes the diet complete and wholesome, and the 
rats fed thereon grew rapidly, reached their full 
size, reproduced their kind, and lived out the 
normal span of rat life as healthy, well-nourished 
individuals. A similar improvement to the above 
diet for rats can be secured by the addition of 
leafy vegetables, such as spinach, cabbage, turnip 
tops, etc. 

The chief deficiencies in the experimental diet 
is probably that of both the fat-soluble and the 
water-soluble vitamines and of mineral, partic- 
ularly calcium, needed for bone growth. All 

47 



Eating for Health and Strength 

these elements may be supplied either from whole 
milk or from leafy vegetables. 

The diet which proved so disastrous for these 
rats is not very different from the diet used by a 
great portion of our population. At least the 
bulk of conventional food is of a similar nature, 
consisting largely of refined cereal products, po- 
tatoes or other root vegetables and meat. That 
similar disastrous results do not occur more 
frequently in human experience is merely be- 
cause the diet is not held rigidly to such foods, 
but includes at least some variety of fruits, leafy 
vegetables and dairy products or eggs. 

The biological method of research by animal 
experimentation has thrown much light upon the 
importance of the various mineral salts. While 
the presence of these minerals in food was known 
to the chemists, they were not able to tell us in 
just what quantities they were needed, nor in 
just what form. Indeed, it is impossible for the 
chemist to find this out, for he changes the form 
of the minerals from organic to inorganic in the 
process of his analysis. By animal experimenta- 
tion it is possible to determine what minerals are 
essential and from what foods they may best be 
derived. Indeed, this experimentation may be 
extended to human beings; thus, at the time of 
the present writing, the food experts of Colum- 

48 



New Discoveries of Experimental Biology 

bia University are conducting researches to de- 
termine the amount of calcium necessary for the 
proper growth of children. This calcium, needed 
for bone growth, can best be secured from milk. 
While no intelligent man, who was not poverty 
driven, would deprive his child of the milk needed 
for its growth, yet, among the poorer classes 
of our large cities, children are frequently stunted 
and diseased by just such deprivation. There- 
fore, the scientific determination of the quantity 
of milk needed will presumably be of importance 
in arousing legislation to protect these children. 

A further fund of information which these 
biological experimenters have uncovered relates 
to the relative value of various protein foods. 

In the previous chapters I have mentioned the 
fact that proteins are highly complex substances, 
composed of many similar but distinct chemical 
compounds known as the amino-acids. The chem- 
ists were able to discover these amino-acids and 
to determine the various percentages of each con- 
tained in the various proteins. But this informa- 
tion was of no particular use, because the chem- 
ists could not find out in what proportion the 
living body required these numerous substances. 

It was here that the biological experimenters 
took up the problem by feeding experiments. 
They found out some surprising facts about the 

49 



Eating foe Health and Strength 

relative value of protein from various sources. 
In one test, rats were given a diet complete and 
well balanced in respect of fats, carbohydrates, 
mineral salts and vitamines. To such a diet the 
protein from a single food would be given until 
an amount was found which was just sufficient 
to maintain the weight of the experimental 
animal. The following table shows the amount 
of protein from various sources needed to keep 
up such weight : 

TABLE 

Per cent of 
the entire food 

Milk protein 3 

Oats protein 4.5 

Corn protein 6 

Wheat protein 6 

Rice protein 6 

Flaxseed protein 8 

Bean protein 12 

Pea protein 12 

A somewhat similar experiment was conducted 
in feeding young pigs; but in this case the pro- 
tein was supplied in abundance and the amount 
retained or converted into living tissue by the 
pigs was determined. The figures are as follows : 

TABLE 

Per cent 

Corn protein 20 

Wheat protein 23 

Oat protein 26 

Milk protein 63 

50 



New Discoveries of Experimental Biology 

These results show how dangerous it is to de- 
pend upon chemical analysis alone in matters 
of food science. From both experiments, the 
great superiority of milk protein was revealed. 
We also observe beans and peas were not so 
highly rated as sources of protein, really not 
supplying any more net protein to the body than 
the cereals, which the chemist tells us contain 
only about half so much protein, but which the 
biologist finds to be twice as well utilized. 

Although the data is not available in regard to 
all foods, we have sufficient facts to warrant us 
to believe that the natural animal foods — milk 
products and eggs — supply the highest grade of 
protein. The protein from meats is more avail- 
able than that from vegetables, but there are 
other objections to meat that do not apply to 
milk and eggs. Of proteins of vegetable origin, 
we have reason to believe that the best are de- 
rived from the active growing cells of plant life, 
rather than from the stored protein in the dried 
seed. Those seeds which contain the' greatest 
quantity of protein seem to have protein of the 
poorest quality, and it is, therefore, a mistake to 
attempt to derive our protein from beans, peas, 
nuts, etc. We need little protein; hence we 
should get it from the very best sources, and 
these are unquestionably milk, cheese and eggs. 

51 *" 



CHAPTER V 
What to Eat 

IN this chapter we will consider the dietetic 
* values of various foods. Our estimate of the 
worth of various foods, or groups of foods, will 
take into consideration all scientific facts dis- 
cussed in the last three chapters, that is, the 
chemical analysis, digestibility and effect upon 
the digestive action, and also the question of the 
presence or deficiency of vitamines, etc. But in 
this chapter we will consider the foods for their 
qualitative worth only. The questions of pro- 
portioning the food, and of the total quantity of 
food to be used will then be considered in the 
two chapters that follow. 

In considering the entire list of human foods, 
the simplest and most natural grouping or divi- 
sion is that of animal versus vegetable foods. The 
question of vegetarianism is indeed the oldest, 
and has been the most discussed of all food 
problems. Modern scientists insist that man is 
omnivorous — that is, that he can eat and can, if 
necessary, live on either vegetable or animal 
foods, or a combination of the two. In this re- 

52 



What to Eat 



spect he differs, on one hand, from such species 
as the cow or horse, which are obviously vege- 
tarian; and on the other hand, from the lion or 
wolf, which are strictly carnivorous. Man shares 
this omnivorous habit with many other species. 
To mention familiar examples: the rat, the pig 
and the chicken. 

Man, like other omnivorous species, has teeth 
and digestive organs that are intermediate be- 
tween the strictly vegetarian and the strictly 
carnivorous species. Many students of the sub- 
ject, have, however, questioned the fact that man 
is naturally a meat-eating animal. They hold 
the view that his teeth and digestive organs are 
adapted to a diet of fruits and nuts, which are 
unquestionably the chief items of food eaten by 
man's nearest kin, the apes, and therefore, pre- 
sumably, by man's ape-like ancestors. These 
two views are not as divergent as they may at 
first seem, for most apes probably add to their 
nut and fruit diet birds' eggs, and perhaps some 
insects and lizards. 

All things considered, we are safe in assuming 
that man's natural diet was predominantly a 
vegetarian one, with a smaller proportion of 
foods of animal origin. The two chief changes 
in the diet of civilized man are the inclusion of 
meat from larger animals, and hence in larger 

53 



Eating for Health and Strength 

quantities, and the use of grains or cereals. 
Neither of these types of foods which make up 
the bulk of man's present diet were available to 
his ape-like ancestors. The use of weapons and 
of fire accounted for the addition of meat, and 
the development of agriculture and devices for 
the harvesting and milling of grain made pos- 
sible the second addition. Such resources greatly- 
increased the total foods available for man, and 
largely accounted for the increase of the species, 
and the establishment of the human animal as the 
ruler of the earth. 

It does not follow, however, that the diet con- 
sisting chiefly of meat and grain is the most 
wholesome and beneficial diet that man can use. 
Indeed, present-day scientific knowledge indi- 
cates that such a diet is not the best, and that 
while it has advantages of economy, its use has 
only been possible because it has been supple- 
mented by animal products, such as milk and 
eggs, and by a considerable variety of vegetable 
foods other than grains. 

No one today among civilized men advocates 
an exclusive meat diet, except where prescribed 
for the treatment of consumption and other 
diseases. Indeed, no men have ever existed upon 
it, except the Eskimos, and their rather miserable 
existence has been possible only by the abundant 

54 



What to Eat 



use of the internal organs of animals — a diet 
which no civilized man would care to adopt. The 
meat diet may have advantages to the Eskimo 
not only because the fat gives him large quanti- 
ties of fuel to keep him warm, but because lean 
meat stimulates the rate of heat production in 
the body during the process of its digestion. 

On the other hand, many races and groups of 
men have existed upon an exclusively vegetarian 
diet. The consensus of opinion today is that the 
best diet for man is what is known as the lacto- 
vegetarian diet, that is, a diet consisting of foods 
of vegetable origin, supplemented by milk (and 
milk products ) , or milk and eggs. 

Moderate quantities of meat foods may be used 
in the diet without materially changing its effect. 
And remember that lamb, veal, and pig of all 
kinds should especially be avoided. When you 
actually need meat, beef is probably the best kind 
to select, though mutton can sometimes be recom- 
mended. My favorite meat is the top cut of 
"round" steak ground up and boiled for one or 
two minutes in a few spoonfuls of water or until 
the red color disappears. It is also palatable 
broiled. Chicken and fish are also desirable 
meats, but not as nourishing as beef. 

Meat, however, is inferior to milk and eggs in 
most cases — there are exceptions. Both groups 

55 



Eating for Health and Strength 

of food supply growth proteins of superior qual- 
ity to those derived from any vegetable foods, 
but meat is deficient in minerals and in vitamines. 
A diet consisting of a goodly variety of vege- 
tables, including an abundance of green leafy 
vegetables, and containing a small proportion of 
meat, will support life without the use of milk. 
This indeed is the type of diet upon which 
Chinese and Japanese have subsisted for centu- 
ries. Population is too congested in those coun- 
tries to permit of the keeping of dairy herds; 
they do, however, keep poultry, and hence eat 
eggs. But this Oriental diet is not equal, espec- 
ially from the standpoint of the nourishment of 
children, to the diet available in dairying coun- 
tries. Recognizing this fact, the Japanese Gov- 
ernment has made every effort to increase the 
dairy industry in their crowded land, and in lieu 
of their inability to produce sufficient milk, the 
Japanese import condensed milk from other 
countries. 

Meat adds no essential food values that can not 
be derived more cheaply from other sources if 
the digestive organs are normal. As used in the 
conventional American diet, meat supplies en- 
tirely too much protein, which sometimes results 
in overburdening the excretory organs with nitro- 
genous waste products. Moreover, meat con- 

56 



What to Eat 



tains the waste products of the animal and these 
substances are very similar to the waste from 
human cells, though with a healthy digestion this 
is easily eliminated in the alimentary canal. 

For the further consideration of foods of 
vegetable origin, we can divide them in the fol- 
lowing groups : 

Grains and Grain Products 

Roots or Tubers 

Leafy Vegetables 

Fruits 

Nuts 

Extracted Oils 

Extracted or Manuiactured Sugars 

All of the above groups of foods are whole- 
some and may be included in the diet, but they 
are not equally complete, or of equal dietetic 
worth. Some of these foods, while harmless if 
used in moderate quantities and in proper com- 
bination with other foods, result in a seriously 
deficient diet if used in such proportions as to 
crowd out other groups. 

Because of the mistakes of flour manufacturers 
all grains and grain products could be entirely 
eliminated from the human diet, and thereby 
decrease the danger of dietetic deficiencies and 
inadequate nutrition. But it is difficult to do this 
because grains and their products supply the 
great bulk of human food. Indeed it would not 

57 



Eating for Health and Strength 

t>e possible, without revolutionary changes in our 
agriculture and food producing methods, to sup- 
port the human race without the use of grain. 

Grains are the seeds of various grass plants. 
The bulk of the substance of all grains is starch. 
Together with this starch is incorporated from 
eight to fifteen per cent of vegetable protein. 
This protein we will ignore in the present dis- 
cussion as it is not of a very high order of nutritive 
value and better protein may be derived from 
other sources. The starchy substance of grain 
may be ground up to produce flours and meals 
which keep well and which are the basis of our 
bread-making and baking arts. In addition to 
this starchy portion, which fills the endosperm 
or bulky interior of the grain, all grains have an 
outer coating of bran, and also a germ. The 
milling industry adopted the practice of remov- 
ing both bran and germ. There were several 
reasons for this. In the first place, the bran and 
germ cannot be ground as fine as the starchy 
interior of the grain. Also, they are usually 
darker in color. Therefore the inclusion of the 
bran and germ produces a coarser, darker flour. 
The refined flour from which these elements of 
grain have been removed is whiter and finer and, 
incidentally, will make a lighter, airier loaf of 
bread. Such a flour appealed to the fastidious 

58 



What to Eat 



taste of the housewife; hence as they developed 
machinery with which to manufacture it, the 
millers vied with each other in the production of 
the whitest, finest flour possible. Another reason 
that favored the production of this super-refined 
flour was that the exclusion of the germ made 
the flour of better keeping qualities. The germ 
contains a small proportion of oil, and if the flour 
was stale, this oil became slightly rancid, giving 
the flour a strong flavor. 

In the manufacture of degerminated cornmeal, 
both the bran and the germ are removed. While 
rice is never ground, this same idea of a white 
and seemingly pure product resulted in the de- 
velopment of the process of polishing, in which 
the bran and germ are rubbed off the grain. 

In all these cases, the removal of the bran and 
germ results in a serious loss in nutritive values. 
The interior white portion of the grain is almost 
entirely devoid of minerals and vitamines. These 
are more abundant in the bran and germ ; more- 
over, the bran, especially in the case of wheat, is 
exceedingly valuable to give bulk to the diet and 
prevent constipation or intestinal congestion. 

If white flour and similar denatured cereal 
products were used only in small quantities and 
combined with ample quantities of milk and 
green vegetables, it is probable that no serious 

59 



Eating for Health and Strength 

harm would come from their use. But, as these 
cereal products, in the form of bread and other 
bakery goods usually compose a large portion of 
the diet, a denaturing of the grain in the milling 
process is a very serious evil. Even though the 
use of the denatured product might be tolerated 
with the precautions above mentioned, the dis- 
carding of the bran and germ is a serious eco- 
nomic waste, for it must be replaced with similar 
nutrients from other and more expensive sources. 

By all means, I heartily advise the use of whole 
wheat and whole wheat products, of cornmeal 
made from the whole grain, and of unpolished 
rice. These natural cereal products contain the 
coarser fibre substance of the bran, and the min- 
erals and vitamines of the germ, and are unques- 
tionably more nearly complete foods than the 
refined products. Used with whole milk or milk 
and butter, the entire grain cereals, particularly 
wheat, make a practically complete diet. Such 
a combination is one of the cheapest and most 
palatable diets possible and may be safely used 
as the basis or bulk of any low-cost diet. 

In cases where there is too much fermentation 
in stomach and bowels, bread of any kind is often 
troublesome. This is especially true where there 
are catarrhal conditions of nose, throat and lungs. 
And this reference applies more particularly to 

60 



What to Eat 



breads made of yeast or other similar ferments. 
Unleavened bread is not so objectionable, though 
a diet devoid of breads of any kind is often de- 
sirable in cases like this. Zwieback can be ex- 
cepted, as its fermentative elements are destroyed 
in the prolonged cooking process to which it is 
exposed. 

Roots and tubers, of which the potato is the 
most used, are somewhat similar to grain in com- 
position. In either case, the bulk of the food 
material is starch — or, in the case of beets and 
sweet potatoes, starch may be in part replaced by 
sugar. But the root vegetables are moist, and 
contain from seventy-five to eighty-five per cent 
of water. If roots are dried, they then become 
quite similar in composition to dry cereal prod- 
ucts. 

The natural roots contain considerably more 
minerals than do the refined cereals. The pro- 
portion of the various minerals are different in 
different root vegetables. Turnips, for illustra- 
tion, are very rich in calcium. Taken as a group, 
the root vegetables are equal or superior to 
whole wheat as a source of minerals. Like the 
grains, the root vegetables are devoid of the fat- 
soluble vitamine which is found in butter or milk 
fat, in the egg yolks and in green leaves. The 
addition of potatoes or other root vegetables to 

61 



Eating for Health and Strength 

a diet of grains and meat does not, therefore, 
make the diet complete. 

The root vegetables should by all means be 
used in the diet in moderate proportions. They 
supply cheap and nourishing fuel food in the 
form of starch and sugar combined with fibrous 
or cellulose matter, and a variety of mineral salts. 
The fact that such vegetables are marketed in a 
moist condition makes them palatable, and per- 
mits of their being cooked and served in a variety 
of pleasing and tasty ways. Moreover, the mill- 
ers have not gotten in their work of refining them 
and removing their more valuable ingredients. 

The leafy vegetables have many attributes to 
recommend them. On the whole, present scien- 
tific knowledge rates them as the most essential 
foods known, with the exception of milk and eggs. 
This does not mean that leafy vegetables would 
do as the whole diet of man. Indeed, they are 
so bulky that a man would have difficulty in eat- 
ing enough of them to sustain life. But their use 
to supplement other foods and prevent the defi- 
ciencies of our conventional foods cannot be too 
highly recommended. 

The essential qualities of leafy foods are : first, 
the vitamines, all of which seem to be present in 
leaves; second, the minerals, in which leaves are 
very rich ; and third, in the presence of cellulose, 

62 



What to Eat 



which gives bulk to the food in the same way that 
wheat bran does. Leaves are also richer in pro- 
tein than grains or roots, and this protein is 
probably more available than the stored protein 
of dry vegetable food. 

As an illustration of the mineral value of 
leaves, spinac h contains more phosphorus, cal- 
cium and iron in proportion to its other food 
ingredients than any other food of which we 
have the analysis. Lettuce ranks as a very close 
second. Cabbage, in which the leaf is not quite 
so active, has only about half as much mineral 
as spinach. But all these leafy foods out -rank 
in their proportion of mineral ingredients any 
of the foods derived from grains, fruits, nuts or 
meat. They are equalled only by milk, cheese 
and eggs. 

It does not, of course, follow that all leaves 
are suitable for human food. The leaves usually 
used are the tender leaves of quick-growing 
vegetables. The leaves of trees usually contain 
tannin or other substances that are either un- 
wholesome or unpalatable. Leaves may also 
have too much cellulose or fibre to be palatable. 
For this reason we prefer the quickly grown 
tender leaf and have selected for garden cultiva- 
tion the tender and more tasty varieties. Tea 
leaves are an illustration of the use of a leaf as a 

63 



Eating for Health and Strength 

food which is hardly in keeping with the recom- 
mendations of leaves here given. The tea leaf is 
nearly as strong in tannin as the oak leaf and, like 
the coffee berry contains an alkaloid narcotic 
peculiar to the species. 

The edible leaves, in their fresh condition, con- 
tain large amounts of water. Hence, they should 
not be valued too highly per pound, as it is only 
the dry weight that counts as food. However, as 
leaves are not to be relied upon for the fuel sup- 
ply of the diet, this watery condition or low 
calory rating does not count heavily against them. 

The high value of leaves as food is attributed 
to the fact that they contain the active, growing 
cells of the plant. This same thing is true of 
buds and very tender shoots, or of seed-pods in 
the immature stages of development. Thus 
asparagus tips and string beans may, for prac- 
tical purposes, be considered in the leafy vege- 
table group of foods. Some of these same 
attributes are found in the immature green corn 
or green pea. 

There are a few vegetables in which the por- 
tion used as food consists of a tender stalk. For 
illustration: celery and rhubarb, or pie-plant. 
These tender stalks rank between the root vege- 
tables and the leaves in food quality. 

There are a few foods classed as vegetables 

64 



What to Eat 



commercially which botanically rank as fruits; 
such as melons, tomatoes, cucumbers and the 
egg-plant. Melons have no particular food 
value; they consist chiefly of sugar and water. 
The cucumber is about as devoid of food value 
as any substance eaten by man. The pulp of 
pumpkins and squashes ranks somewhat lower 
than the poorest root vegetables. The value of 
the pumpkin pie is in the milk and egg. 

The tomato, on the other hand, is a distinctive 
and valuable food, being rich in minerals and in 
organic acids. 

Fresh fruits, considered for the food substance 
contained, are the most expensive of all foods. 
This expense is due to the fact that fresh fruits 
contain very large quantities of water. Dried 
fruits are of much greater value per pound. 
Such foods as dates, figs, raisins and prunes, even 
considered from the standpoint of their caloric 
or fuel value, are worth nearly as much as dried 
cereals. In all other attributes they excel cere- 
als. In the first place, their fuel substance is in* 
the form of sugar, and this natural sugar, unlike 
that from the cane or beet, is already in the form 
in which it may be absorbed directly into the 
blood; hence, is less likely to ferment in the di- 
gestive organs. Secondly, fruits contain min- 
erals which are absent from refined sugar. Fruits 

65 



Eating for Health and Strength 

also contain a proper amount of fibre or cellulose 
which aids digestion. Lastly, fruits contain 
organic acids which, strange to say, actually pre- 
vent an acid condition of the blood. This seem- 
ing contradiction is due to the fact that the 
organic fruit acids are really acid salts formed 
of a combination of organic acids with basic or 
alkaline minerals. In the process of digestion 
and assimilation, the organic acids are oxidized, 
freeing the alkaline salts for new combinations 
which serve to neutralize the harmful acids devel- 
oped by the physiological processes. 

The vitamine content of fruits has not been 
fully investigated, but we know that the juice of 
limes or oranges is a remedy for scurvy, and we 
may safely assume that fruits contain the water- 
soluble vitamine. Fruits are probably deficient 
in the fat-soluble vitamine, which seems to be 
supplied in abundance only from milk or egg fat, 
or from green vegetables. 

No scientific consideration of the subject can 
fully portray the dietetic value of fruits; for 
above all other foods, their value lies in the flavor 
or appetizing quality, and the consequent pleas- 
ure to be derived from their use. Fruits are the 
natural dessert and should be used as such. With 
the possible exception of dates, figs and raisins, 
fruits are not to be considered as suitable for 



What to Eat 



forming any great bulk of the diet, or replacing 
other food groups. But these sweet fruits may 
be very profitably used in the place of artificial 
sugars, and also to cut down the quantity of 
cereal starch. 

Nuts are botanically similar to grains or dried 
legumes in that they are the seeds of plants. 
We, therefore, assume the nut to be deficient in 
vitamines and minerals as are other seeds; but 
nuts differ markedly from grain in that the 
stored fuel food is predominantly in the form of 
fat instead of in starch. This makes the nut 
about twice as valuable, even as a source of fuel. 
A certain portion of fat is necessary in the diet 
as a matter of palatability. 

Nuts have played a prominent part in all vege- 
tarian menus. The high rating so given them was 
originally due to the fact that they are the rich- 
est in protein of any vegetable foods, with the 
possible exception of beans and peas. From our 
present knowledge we do not rate this protein so 
highly, both because we now realize that the body 
does not need so much protein, and because we 
now know that vegetable proteins are not as 
assimilable by man as protein of animal origin. 
Thus it would seem that our recent knowledge 
indicates that we formerly placed too high a value 
upon nuts. This much may still be said in their 

67 



Eating for Health and Strength 

favor: the nut protein is free from any of the 
toxic waste products that may be present in flesh 
foods. Also the fat of nuts is exceedingly nutri- 
tious and wholesome and has a decided advantage 
from the standpoint of digestibility over the 
animal fats which are used in frying or in the 
making of pastry. 

Nuts should be used in the diet as a food, not 
as a relish; that is, they should be a part of the 
meal and not taken in addition to the meal. Nut 
meats should be thoroughly masticated, as they 
are not digestible when swallowed in large par- 
ticles. 

While nuts are not essential to the diet, they 
are a pleasing and tasty food and may be very 
profitably used in moderate quantities, especially 
in those diets from which meats and animal fats 
are eliminated. 

Extracted fats or oils, whether of animal or 
vegetable origin, have no food value whatever 
except as a source of fuel. In this respect, pure 
oil is worth about two and one-quarter times as 
much as sugar, or two and one-half times as much 
as dry cereals. No diet is palatable and pre- 
sumably is not wholesome without some propor- 
tion of fat. The best source of fat in food is in 
the form of the emulsified fat of milk, cream or 
egg yolks — or in a somewhat more concentrated 

68 



What to Eat 



condition in butter and cheese. In all these 
cases the fat contains the highly important fat- 
soluble vitamine which does not exist in such fats 
as lard, cotton-seed oil or oleomargarine. 

The second preferable form of fat is that of 
nuts. The amount of extracted nut fat to be used 
in the diet will depend upon the amounts used in 
the above-mentioned and preferred forms. I 
should say that, in a meatless diet, the use of 
niilk, butter, eggs and nuts would supply all 
the fat actually needed, but that an additional 
amount may be used in the form of oil, either 
alone or combined with other ingredients, as 
salad dressings. 

Where fat is used in all the above-mentioned 
forms, the additional use of fat in the frying of 
foods or in the concocting of rich pastries is a 
wasteful and harmful habit. In the first place, 
such additional fat is not needed and is therefore 
inclined to over-enrich the diet and lead to over- 
eating. Secondly, the combination of fat with 
starch and sugar, either in frying or when mixed 
with the ingredients, results in a product which 
is notoriously difficult of digestion. Thirdly, 
such fats are absolutely devoid of minerals, pro- 
teins and vitamines, and hence their use increases 
the danger of deficiency of some of these most 
essential elements. 

69 



Eating for Health and Strength 

All that has been said about the surplus use 
of fat in cooking applies to the use of fat meat. 
It has nothing to recommend it at all, except that 
of being a source of fuel energy in a most con- 
centrated form. Its use may be excusable in the 
diet of the Eskimo, or other men doing severe 
work in rigorous climates, but for the ordinary 
American, especially if he be an indoor worker, 
the use of fat meat or excessive fat in any form 
is a dietetic evil. 

Many of the arguments above given against 
the use of fat apply to the use of ordinary com- 
mercial sugar. In the plants from which sugar 
is derived, it is at least combined with mineral 
salts, cellulose and the water-soluble vitamines. 
But in the refining process, all these elements 
are discarded and we have chemically pure sugar. 
We have no reason to believe that sugar in itself 
is any other than a wholesome food, but the 
trouble is that we add it to a diet of refined 
cereals, meats, potatoes, and refined fats, all of 
which are already deficient. This addition of 
sugar merely results in increasing the proportion 
of such deficiency. 

If any one of the deficient foods enumerated in 
this chapter were the sole offender in a diet other- 
wise made up of natural foods, there would be 
little occasion for concern over its use. But when 

TO 



What to Eat 



the millers rob us of the minerals and vitamines 
of our grains, and we then add large quantities 
of refined fats and sugars, the danger of food 
deficiency is very real. It may be possible to pro- 
tect against such deficiencies by the use of milk 
and green vegetables, but the wiser plan would 
be to use also natural whole grain products, and 
to cut down the quantity of refined fats and 
sugars to the minimum amount necessary to pre- 
pare our food in palatable form. Even this last 
suggestion is merely a concession to convention, 
for it is entirely possible to select a diet contain- 
ing dairy products, nuts and sweet fruits from 
which refined fats and sugars may be eliminated 
altogether. 



71 



CHAPTER VI 
Balancing the Diet 

TN addition to knowing which are the better 
* foods to use, it is important that we should 
have some idea of the proportions in which to use 
them and how to combine them into tasty menus 
which shall also form an adequate or complete 
diet. 

The most common fault in the American bill 
of fare is' the over-use of meats, denatured grain 
foods (including breads, pastries and "cereal" 
dishes), potatoes, and refined sugars and fats. 

The simplest remedy for this fault is the de- 
crease of the foods mentioned, and the increased 
proportions of milk, butter, cheese and eggs and 
of leafy vegetables. The increased use of natural 
whole cereals, fruits, nuts and a general assort- 
ment of vegetables, while not so important as 
the milk and greens, is generally beneficial and 
advisable. 

Any menus prepared with these facts in mind 
will not be far wrong. 

In considering the subject of proportioning 
and combining the foods, we should distinguish 

72 






Balancing the Diet 



between the matter of food combinations in a 
single dish or a single meal, and the question of 
the combinations or proportions of various foods 
in the general diet over longer periods. 

Our reasons for considering the more immedi- 
ate combinations is either a matter of taste and 
palatability or a question of the digestibility of 
foods eaten together, or eaten at the same meal. 
This question of immediate combination of foods 
has little to do with the balancing of the diet as 
a whole. The body has power to store the various 
elements of nutrition for a considerable period; 
therefore it is not necessary that we use all essen- 
tial groups of nutritive elements in the same 
meal, or even in the same day. A breakfast made 
of sweet fruits and nuts, a dinner with an ample 
proportion of green vegetables, and a supper 
with an adequate quantity of milk would be more 
satisfactory from the standpoint of nutrition than 
if all these food groups were included in each and 
every meal. The digestion would be better, due 
to the simplification of the meal, and the fact that 
the digestive ferments would have fewer kinds of 
substances with which to deal. 

On the question of the exact combinations of 
food ingredients in each meal we have very little 
definite knowledge. Even some of the views 
generally held on this question are without scien- 

73 



Eating for Health and Strength 

tine foundation. Thus we are almost invariably 
told that one should not eat acid fruit with milk. 
The prejudice against this combination arises 
from the fact that milk mixed with an acid is 
curdled, producing a product of unattractive 
appearance and which is supposed to be indi- 
gestible. As a matter of fact, milk is invariably 
curdled in the stomach by the hydrochloric acid. 
Hence its mixture with the milder fruit juice 
only anticipates this step a little and probably 
does not affect the digestibility at all. 

Another combination against which we are 
sometimes warned is that of acid fruits and 
starches. There is a little more scientific theory 
to back this teaching. Starch is only digested 
in an alkaline medium, and hence the addition of 
acid in the food may interfere with its digestion. 
Even in this case it is probable that, in a healthy 
digestive tract, the acid is over-balanced by the 
stimulation of an extra section of alkali, and 
hence the matter is automatically righted. 

The question of immediate combination foods 
must rest, more or less, with the individual and 
his personal observation of the ease with which 
he digests various combinations. If he finds that 
a particular dish or food combination gives him 
digestive trouble of any sort, it is best either to 
eliminate the trouble-giving foods altogether, or 

74 



Balancing the Diet 



to seek out simpler ways or simpler combinations 
in which to use them. 

Individuals differ greatly in their digestive 
capacity, and in their susceptibility to digestive 
troubles because of various foods or food com- 
binations. There are some dishes that are notor- 
iously indigestible, such as mince pie, plum pud- 
ding or pig's knuckles and other heavy, "rich" 
dishes. These will naturally be avoided by any 
careful person. But with simpler and more 
wholesome dishes, such as are advised in this 
book, the question of immediate food combina- 
tions need not trouble you, unless from personal 
experience you find that they give you distress. 

The two following menus, both of which in- 
clude meat foods, will illustrate the difference 
between an unbalanced or deficient diet and a 
balanced or adequate one. Three meals per day 
are presented because of conventional require- 
ment, but my own personal requirements consist 
of one or two hearty meals daily, though the num- 
ber of meals daily is entirely a matter of habit, 
and is not of great importance, provided one 
does not eat without appetite, merely because it 
is meal time, and does not eat beyond his digestive 
capacity. It is the quantity and quality of the 
diet, not the meal plan that is important. This 
is dealt with more fully in later chapters. 

75 



Eating for Health and Strength 

A DEFICIENT MENU 
Breakfast 

Oatmeal with cream and sugar 

Hot cakes with glucose or sugar syrup 

Sausages 

Coffee 

Dinner 

Roast Beef with gravy 

Mashed Potatoes 

White Bread and Nut Margarine 

Canned Corn 

Apple Pie 

Supper 

Beef Broth with Crackers 

Salmon Patties 

White Bread with Nut Margarine 

Rice or Tapioca Pudding 

Tea and Cakes 

AN ADEQUATE MENU 
Breakfast 

Whole Wheat Bread or Muffins 

with Honey and Dairy Butter 
An Orange, or Soaked Prunes with Nuts 
Cocoa or Cereal Coffee with plenty of Cream 
or Rich Milk 

Dinner 

Kale or other Greens 
Eggs or Beef or other meat 
Corn Bread and Butter 
Pumpkin Pie 
Cereal Coffee 

Supper 

Cream of Celery Soup 

Salmon and Lettuce Salad 

Whole Wheat Bread and Dairy Butter 

Fruit Gelatine Dessert 

Grape Juice Punch 

76 



Balancing the Diet 



The first of these menus is over-supplied with 
denatured cereal products and utterly lacking 
in green vegetables. A hard working man able 
to consume large quantities of such food might 
exist on it, even without the addition of milk. 
For a growing child or a person of sedentary 
occupation, the diet would be unsafe. Even the 
addition of milk, while it would help somewhat, 
would still leave the diet devoid of bulky vege- 
table fibre, which fact would probably produce 
constipation; moreover, the body's craving for 
missing elements would likely lead to over-eating 
and consequent obesity. 

When using milk also carefully note that sweet 
milk does not combine very well with meats, 
cooked eggs or some cooked vegetables. It is 
better to make milk a large part of a meal when 
used, and combine sweet or acid fruits with it. 
Dates or raisins are ideal with it, though prunes, 
figs or other sweet fruits can be recommended. 

Soured milk products will combine satisfac- 
torily with nearly all foods. 

When digestion is normal vegetarian diets are 
generally safer than meat diets because the ab- 
sence of meat usually results in the eating of a 
greater variety of fruits and vegetables in an 
effort to gain palatability. But it is very easy 
for a vegetarian diet also to be inadequate for 

77 



Eating foe Health and Strength 

complete nutrition if large quantities of cereal 
starches are used. The following two examples 
will illustrate the difference between a deficient 
and an adequate vegetarian menu: 

A DEFICIENT VEGETARIAN MENU 

Breakfast 

Cream of Wheat (Farina) with Sugar and Milk 
Fried Mush with Syrup 
Stewed Prunes 
Cereal Coffee 

Dinner 

Bean Soup with Crackers 

Baked Potatoes with Nut Butter 

Bread Pudding 

Supper 

Macaroni with Tomato Sauce 
Stewed Carrots with Cream Sauce 
Nuts and Raisins 
Fruit Punch 

AN ADEQUATE VEGETARIAN MENU 

Breakfast 

Oranges 

Whole Boiled Wheat with Nuts and Raisins 

Milk 

Dinner 

Bean Soup with Whole Wheat Bread 

Cabbage or Cauliflower dressed with Butter Sauce 

Macaroni and Cheese 

Supper 

Mush, made of Whole Ground Corn and served 

with plenty of Milk 
A Lettuce-Fruit Salad 

78 



Balancing the Diet 



The first of the above named menus contains 
entirely too much cereal food, and that cereal in 
a denatured form. The use of nut butter and 
fruits and vegetables given will not protect such 
a diet from deficiencies. The second diet is 
equally simple and inexpensive. By the in- 
clusion of milk, butter and cheese and a little 
leafy vegetables the menu becomes a safe one. 

The following simple rules will summarize the 
principles we have been considering and will 
serve as a guide for the selecting and proportion- 
ing of foods in the planning of menus. 

The use of too much milk with other foods will 
at times make one more liable to colds and the 
various diseases that begin with symptoms of this 
nature, though milk will always insure a satis- 
factory quantity of nourishment. Some use a 
quart of fresh whole milk a day for each member 
of the family. This is usually too liberal a por- 
tion though it will cover a multitude of other 
possible defects in the diet, provided there is no 
tendency to colds. It is given as a safe minimum, 
especially for growing children, in case other 
foods of the milk group are not used. If dairy 
butter, eggs, and cheese are used liberally in the 
diet, the quantity of milk per person may be 
reduced to a pint or less a day. But growing 
children should have their full allowance of a 

79 



Eating for Health and Strength 

quart of fresh whole milk and consume corre- 
spondingly less of other foods if you are not 
sure they are being thoroughly nourished with 
other foods. With my own children, when I 
give them a liberal quantity of milk they are 
given fruit only (acid or sweet) with it. Raisins 
and milk or dates and milk is a favorite meal. 
When giving them a hearty meal composed of a 
full variety of foods I rarely give them milk. 
It is not desirable, and they do not need it at such 
times. For milk used in cookery, canned or 
evaporated milk may be substituted for the fresh, 
the equivalent ratio being a pound can of the 
evaporated milk for a quart of the fresh. 

Use at least one dish of leafy vegetables per 
day — or better still, one cooked dish of such vege- 
tables and one of uncooked salad. Do not merely 
use a few leaves of lettuce or sprigs of parsley 
and call it a leafy salad; use ample quantities 
of lettuce or other salad greens, combining with 
other ingredients desired to give variety and 
flavor. 

The problem of getting leafy vegetables' in all 
markets at all seasons of the year is sometimes 
a vexatious one. On northern farms or in small 
towns there are often few leafy foods available 
from November to May. Cabbage and celery, 
however, are leafy foods which keep well in the 

80 



Balancing the Diet 



winter. Kale, which should be more grown, has 
wonderful frost-resisting powers, and will stay 
green through the winter in all but the most 
severe climates. In large city markets, even in 
the North, kale, spinach and lettuce are on sale 
throughout the winter. If, for a time, no fresh 
leafy vegetables are available, use canned spin- 
ach, canned string beans, and an abundance of 
general fruits and vegetables. 

Use whole grain products in both breads and 
cereal dishes. This rule can be departed from, 
in part, where the diet is adequately protected 
otherwise, as here advised. White flour has some 
uses in cookery, for which whole wheat flour 
cannot be easily substituted. There is no excuse, 
however, for the use of the devitalized white flour 
bread in any diet unless you are suffering from 
chronic diarrhea; then it may be advised for a 
short time. Moreover, once you have found 
where you can buy, or learn to make a good 
quality of whole wheat bread, you will find that 
you prefer it to the white variety. The same 
is true of whole cornmeal and of unpolished rice. 

Use sugar sparingly. Instead, use more 
sweet fruits, honey, and, if possible, maple syrup. 
Honey is the easiest of all sweets to digest, 
provided its nourishing elements are needed 
by the body. 

81 



Eating for Health and Strength 

If you use meat at all, learn to use it as a 
flavor food and not as a filling food. A quarter 
of a pound per person per day is usually an 
ample quantity. 

Use nuts, if you wish, in the place of meat. 
Not that they are specifically needed as a meat 
substitute, but rather that nuts used in cookery 
will produce many delightful dishes and, there- 
fore, reduce the temptation to use meat because 
of habit or appetite. But to use large quantities 
of both nuts and meat is foolish. It unduly 
enriches the diet in protein and fat. 

Use vegetable oils in salad dressings and in 
cooking operations that require fat. Do not use 
vegetable oils or nut margarines as a substitute 
for dairy butter, except in menus containing very 
considerable quantities of milk, or of milk and 
eggs, or milk and cheese. 

Use as much fresh fruit as you can reasonably 
afford. 

Use beans, peas and macaroni — so-called meat 
substitutes — as you would use rice or hominy. 
These foods are tasty, but have no superior value 
over similar filling dishes derived from grains. 

A very practical way to check up on the proper 
proportioning or balancing of the diet is by "bal- 
ancing the grocery bill." This is only an ap- 
proximate method, to be sure, and no absolute 



Balancing the Diet 



rules can be laid down because of the wide varia- 
tions of food prices with locations, and from year 
to year or season to season. Notwithstanding 
these wide variations in price the summary of 
the grocery bill with the items classified by groups 
will generally show whether the diet is approxi- 
mately correct or seriously unbalanced. 

The following food lists will illustrate this 
method. They may be taken as the grocery bills 
of two families, each consisting of a man and wife 
and two half grown children. The prices are 
those prevailing in New York City at the time 
this book is being written, and while these prices 
will not be good for any other place and time, 
yet the relative prices will not be very far off. 
In both lists the weekly bill comes to just about 
ten dollars and both lists contain approximately 
the same fuel value or effective food quantity. 

A BADLY BALANCED GROCERY BILL 

Whole fresh Milk, 7 quarts @ 15c $1.05 

Evaporated Milk, 3 cans @ 12c 36 

Milk Group, $1.41 

Meat, 9 pounds @ 30c Meat Group, 2.70 

Oleomargarine, 2 pounds @ 30c 60 

Lard, one pound @ 25c 25 

Sugar, 3 pounds @ 10c 30 



Oil and Sugar Group, $1.15 
83 



Eating for Health and Strength 

Potatoes, 10 pounds @ 4c 40 

Sweet Potatoes, 2 pounds @ 5c 10 

Onions, 3 pounds @ 4c 12 

Root Vegetable Group, $ .62 

(None used) Leafy Vegetable Group, $ .00 

Bananas $ .20 

Canned Fruit 1 .00 

Fruit Group, $1.20 

White Bread, 14 loaves @ 10c $1.40 

Oatmeal and Breakfast Foods 50 

Cakes and Pastry 1 .00 

Grain Products Group, $2.90 
Total Bill $9.98 

A WELL BALANCED GROCERY BILL 

Whole fresh Milk, 14 quarts @ 15c $2.10 

Evaporated Milk, 5 cans @ 12c 60 

Cheese, full cream, 1 pound @ 40c 40 

Butter, 1 pound @ 50c 50 

Eggs, 1 dozen @ 50c 50 

Milk Group, $4.10 

Meat, 3 pounds @ 30c $ .90 

Nut Meats, 1 pound @ 70c 70 

Meat Group, $1.60 

Vegetable Oil, 1 pound @ 30c $ .30 

Sugar, 1 pound @ 10c 10 

Honey, 1 pound @ 25c 25 

Oil and Sugar Group, $ .65 
84 



Balancing the Diet 



Potatoes, 5 pounds @ 4c $ .20 

Onions, 3 pounds @ 4c 12 

Carrots, 2 pounds @ 5c 10 

Beets, 3 pounds @ 5c 15 

Root Vegetable Group, $ .57 

Cabbage, 5 pounds @ 4c $ .20 

Lettuce 30 

Celery 20 

Spinach or other greens 15 

Leafy Vegetable Group, $ .85 

Dates, Raisins or Figs, 3 pounds @ 20c . . . .$ .60 

Oranges 25 

Other fresh fruit 25 

Fruit Group, $1.10 

Whole Wheat Bread, 7 loaves @ 10c $ .70 

Navy Beans, 2 pounds @ 10c 20 

Rice, 1 pound 15 

Whole Wheat as cereal, 4 pounds @ 3c 12 

Grain Products Group, $1.17 



Total Bill $10.04 

A study of the two grocery bills given above 
will show that the heaviest items of the first badly 
balanced bill are the meat group and the grain 
products group. 

The milk group is insufficient. At the prices 
of milk given such a deficiency might be made 

85 



Eating for Health and Strength 

with a view of economy, but such economy is lost 
by the introduction of the larger meat item, and 
the use of canned fruits, cakes and pastry. 

The second bill has a large, and, at these prices, 
seemingly extravagant expenditure for the foods 
of the milk group. But the total expenditure 
for all foods is approximately the same and both 
bills furnish approximately the same amount of 
food value as measured in calories. The well- 
balanced grocery bill gives us more variety and 
should be more appetizing for all those not hope- 
lessly wedded to the use of meats and pastries. 

The chief distinction that we wish to point out 
by these two illustrations is not a matter of either 
economy or tastiness in the diet, but the differ- 
ence between the complete versus the inadequate 
diet. With the first bill there would be serious 
danger of deficiency of vitamines and minerals, 
while the second bill has abundance of both. 

Because of the variation in food prices we can- 
not give an absolute rule regarding the percent- 
ages of the total cost of food that should be ex- 
pended for each food group. The following 
general rule will, however, be helpful. 

The expenditure for the milk group, including 
butter, cheese and eggs, should be by far the 
greatest item. The expenditure of an amount 
equaling thirty to forty per cent of the total food 

86 



Balancing the Diet 



bill upon foods of the milk group will do much 
to safeguard the diet against deficiencies. 

The expenditures for grain products need not 
be over ten or fifteen per cent of the total bill; 
this is only possible, however, when cakes and 
pastries and the fancy breakfast foods are omit- 
ted and grain products are used in simple, natur- 
al forms as whole-grained cereals or simply and 
preferably as whole-grained breads. 

There is no need for any of the five remaining 
food groups occasioning an expenditure of more 
than fifteen per cent of the total bill; of these, 
usually the meat and fruit will be the greatest. 
Vegetables should not run over twenty per cent 
of the total bill, and the amount may be kept at 
much lower than this, except during the winter 
season in the large cities; then the necessity of 
securing sufficient leafy vegetables may run this 
item up until it compares with the cost of fresh 
fruits. 

If the expenditures for any one of the seven 
food groups do not vary over five per cent from 
the amounts given below, the diet may be count- 
ed on to be safe and well-balanced. Those who 
are confused by percentages may merely con- 
sider the items in this table as the number of 
cents to be spent for each food group out of each 
dollar of the total food bill. 

87 



Eating for Health and Strength 



APPROXIMATE PERCENTAGES OF EXPENDITURE FOR EACH 
FOOD GROUP 

Per cent 

Milk Group 35 

Meat Group 15 

Oil and Sugar Group 5 

Root Vegetables 10 

Leafy Vegetables . . ." 10 

Fruit 10 

Grains 15 

Total, 100 



Obviously this table is made up for city 
people. Those living on farms will be able to 
secure the foods from some of these groups at 
little cash cost; and attempting to calculate the 
proportions on a farm cost basis would upset 
the balance of the diet. If you live on a farm 
you should be able to secure an adequate diet 
more readily and more cheaply than the cit)^ 
dweller. Yet the fact remains that the farm 
diet is often badly balanced and lacking in the 
items of the milk, leafy vegetables and fruit 
groups. These highly essential foods, for which 
the city man must pay what to the farmer 
would be exorbitant prices, are part of your 
compensation for living away from the bright 
lights and superficial pleasures of city life. 
When you fail to make use of the health-giving 
elements of country life, you lose out all around. 

88 



CHAPTER VII 
How Much to Eat 

TN" Chapter II, I discussed briefly the subject 
of calories. There is no occasion for figuring 
the number of calories in one's food from a prac- 
tical standpoint of eating for health and strength. 
However, we cannot consider the scientific data 
and records of experiments that throw light on 
that question of how much to eat without use of 
the term calory. 

One of the earliest lines of research in food 
science was the effort to formulate dietary stand- 
ards. The method of doing this was the keep- 
ing of records of the quantities of foods eaten by 
various groups and types of people. With the 
kinds and amounts of food known, it was easy to 
figure the total number of calories or the total 
quantity of food, considered as body fuel. 

The following table gives the number of calo- 
ries per man per day for the various occupation 
groups listed. These figures are for the most 
part the averages of the diets of many individ- 
uals, and fairly represent the conventional eat- 
ing habit of Americans. 



Eating for Health and Strength 

QUANTITIES OF FOOD EATEN BY VARIOUS 
OCCUPATIONAL GROUPS 

Calories 
per day 

Football teams 6,590 

Lumbermen 5,420 

Well Paid Laborers 3,925 

College Clubs 3,580 

Professional Men 3,480 

Farmers 3,415 

Southern Negroes 3,395 

Skilled Mechanics 3,355 

Teachers 3,195 

Garment Workers 3,145 

Office Clerks 3,125 

Salesmen 2,980 

Poorly Paid Laborers 2,810 

It is seen that the amounts of food eaten by 
these different groups of people vary widely. 
The chief causes of these variations is the amount 
of muscular labor performed and the amount of 
money available to pay for the food. If indi- 
vidual data be given for different men, or dif- 
ferent families, even in the same occupational 
groups, the figures would also show a wide range 
in quantities of food eaten. 

A very interesting check on these figures on 
the amount of foods commonly eaten by Ameri- 
cans was made by the Hoover Food Adminis- 
tration during the war. Statistics were secured 
of the entire quantity of food consumed in the 
United States. Figured out according to popu- 

90 






How Much to Eat 



lation and reduced to a unit of man per day, 
it was found that the average American man 
consumes 3,424 calories per day. This backs up 
very convincingly the figures secured by measur- 
ing the foods actually eaten by various groups of 
individuals. 

From the studies of the amount of food that 
men do eat, food scientists tried to derive definite 
standards which should serve as a guide to tell 
men how much they should eat. 

Such a table of food standards was drawn up 
by Atwater and was widely published by the 
United States Government. It was as follows: 

ATWATER TABLE OF FOOD STANDARDS 

Calories 

Men at very hard work 5,500 

Men at hard work 4,130 

Men at moderate work 3,500 

Men at light work 3,150 

Men at sedentary occupation or women at 

moderate work 2,700 

Men taking no muscular exercise or women 

at light work 2,450 

This seems to us now to be a rather foolish 
method of reasoning. To assume that what men 
do do is what they should do is certainly not the 
way to learn the truth or to make progress in the 
world. By a similar method of reasoning we 
might determine the average amount of stealing 

91 



Eating for Health and Strength 

that men do and thereby derive a standard of 
thieving. It also reminds one a little of the old 
lady's assurance that every one of us must eat 
his peck of dirt. 

These illustrations are a little far-fetched, but 
even in more closely related instances we can see 
the fallacy of using the average man as a stand- 
ard or guide for those seeking the best way to 
live. The average amount of exercise taken, at 
least by the city dweller, would hardly be ac- 
cepted by the ardent physical culturist as a guide 
for his own practice. In the matter of the body 
weight this same error of accepting the average 
as the standard has actually prevailed — as will 
be fully brought out in our chapters which dis- 
cuss the control of the body weight. 

These dietary standards derived from obser- 
vation upon average eating habits were further 
checked, and to a large extent verified by a more 
elaborate and scientific method. I refer to the 
use of the Respiratory Calorimeter. This inter- 
esting scientific device consists of an air-tight 
chamber properly insulated against loss of heat. 
If a man, or an animal, be placed in such a cham- 
ber it is possible to measure very accurately the 
amount of oxygen consumed and carbon diox- 
ide given off, and so determine the amount of 
oxidation that occurred. By further measure- 

92 



How Much to Eat 



merits may be determined the amount of heat 
generated and the mechanical labor of the test 
subject. By the usual chemical methods, both 
the food and the excretory products may be anal- 
ized. When such researches are continued for 
sufficient time it is also possible to calculate from 
this data, checked by the changes in the body 
weight, the accumulation or loss of fat or protein 
substance from the body. 

By such elaborate and thorough investigation 
scientists were able to learn just how much food 
the body seems to require and how that food was 
consumed or expended in the production of heat, 
muscular work, or in additions to the body 
substance. 

The scientists reasoned that when a man's 
body was not increasing in weight and he was, 
therefore, utilizing all food eaten in the physio- 
logical -and muscular activities, he required the 
exact amount of food so consumed. Experi- 
ments in giving him less food resulted in a loss 
of body weight which seemed most positive evi- 
dence that the amount of food could not be safely 
decreased. 

This was the general state of scientific knowl- 
edge on the subject, "how much to eat," at the 
beginning of the war; moreover, this knowledge 
essentially verified the earlier food standards 

93 



Eating for Health and Strength 

that had been determined by investigating how 
much people do eat. 

However, many health authorities and students 
of food problems who derived their opinions 
from practical observation of the effects of food 
on health and strength questioned these food 
standards which had been determined by elabo- 
rate scientific research. Among physical cultur- 
ists and health reformers generally the opinion 
prevailed that over-eating was not an excep- 
tional, but a general fault. Such men as Horace 
Fletcher and his associates had shown that better 
health could be maintained upon smaller food 
allowances. When Mr. Fletcher was sixty- 
three years of age he was tested in the Calori- 
meter and was shown to oxidize or metabolize 
nine calories per pound of body weight. This was 
the lowest ratio of metabolism observed among 
eighty-nine men tested. Yet Mr. Fletcher at this 
time was by no means poorly nourished, for he 
weighed 180 pounds, and was not a tall man. His 
years of careful eating had made it possible for 
him actually to get fat on less food that other 
men seemed to find necessary for existence. 

Mr. Fletcher believed the chief benefit which 
he derived from his careful eating habits was due 
to thorough mastication. Dr. Chittenden, who 
experimented with Mr. Fletcher's methods upon 

94 



How Much to Eat 



a group of soldiers and athletes, was of the 
opinion that the benefits were due to the use of 
smaller quantities of protein. None of these in- 
vestigators laid chief stress upon the matter of 
total food quantity, though in all such cases 
there was a tendency to reduce it. 

With the coming of the war, all manner of re- 
search in food science was greatly stimulated. 
Food economy became imperative for the whole 
world, and in many countries there was not 
enough food available to maintain anywhere near 
the former eating habits of the people. 

Great suffering, and loss of health and of life 
resulted because of the food shortage during 
the war and the years immediately following; 
but if the teachings of the orthodox food science 
regarding the amount of food necessary had been 
true, the world's death list from food scarcity 
would have been enormously greater. 

The European nations found out that men 
could live on much less food than they customarily 
do eat when their eating habits are determined 
by appetite, and there is ample food and sufficient 
money available to pay for it. 

It is not a convincing argument to claim that 
the Germans or other peoples were benefited by 
the food restrictions imposed by war necessity, 
yet many careful observers of war conditions 

95 



Eating for Health and Strength 

were convinced that, as far as food quantity alone 
was concerned, the restricted diet was actually 
beneficial. The chief suffering came from the 
restriction of food variety and the depreciation 
of food quality. Not only were the poorer classes 
unable to get enough food, but all classes suf- 
fered from lack of proper food; especially from 
shortage of milk, butter and eggs, fats and fresh 
fruits and vegetables. The diet in many in- 
stances was reduced virtually to potatoes and 
cereals, an inadequate diet even if quantities were 
unlimited. Moreover, there was such a vast deal 
of suffering and privation from other than die- 
tary causes that observations of the health, effi- 
ciency, or death rate of the peoples under war 
conditions are practically worthless as far as 
deciding dietary questions is concerned. 

In America, however, scientific researches 
were conducted to determine the effect of re- 
duced quantities of food, and from these re- 
searches we have gained much new knowledge. 
The investigations that I particularly refer to 
were conducted by Dr. Benedict of the Carnegie 
Institution. 

Dr. Benedict experimented upon the students 
of the Y. M. C. A. College at Springfield, Mass. 
Many of the subjects of these experiments were 
taking the training course as Y. M. C. A. physi- 

96 



How Much to Eat 



cal directors and all of them were taking gym- 
nasium work, while many were active in outdoor 
athletics. 

The diet provided in the College dining hall 
supplied 4,000 calories per day. This is a rather 
heavy diet, but the students were very vigorously 
exercised young men. Not all of these men may 
have been in the habit of eating 4,000 calories a 
day, but from actual records it was evident that 
all of them were consuming well above 3,000 
calories per day. 

The method of the restricted diet experiment 
was to cut down the food allowance of each man 
individually until he had lost ten per cent of his 
weight. After such a loss of ten per cent of 
each man's weight, his food was carefully ad- 
justed to a quantity that would just maintain 
the body weight at ninety per cent of the original 
figure. The amount of food that each man re- 
quired to maintain this restricted weight was 
then determined. The amounts varied accord- 
ing to the size of the men and their habits of ac- 
tivity, and ranged from 1,600 to 2,500 calories 
per day. The average figure for the group was 
1,950 calories per day. This was less than half 
the food that had been previously provided for 
these men, and certainly not over two-thirds the 
amount that any such group of men would have 

97 



Eating for Health and Strength 

consumed if following the usual American eating 
habits. 

According to the old pre-war teachings of sci- 
ence it would have been thought that men could 
not have maintained their health and physical 
efficiency upon such small quantities of food. 
But these men did maintain normal health, and 
elaborate studies of both their mental and physi- 
cal efficiency showed that they suffered little, 
if at all, due to living on the much reduced quan- 
tity of food. This is the more remarkable when 
we realize that these men did lose ten per cent of 
their weight and that this loss of weight oc- 
curred in men who entered the experiment as ac- 
tive trained athletes and were not carrying a lot 
of excess fat. Their muscles may have been actu- 
ally reduced in volume, though probably the chief 
loss in weight was due to a loss of a small portion 
of fat that even the athletic man carries, if he be 
a heavy eater. The nude photographs of these 
men after their weight reduction still showed 
them to be fairly well muscled and seemingly in 
fit physical condition. Their athletic records 
and physical tests on reduced diet showed that 
they had lost neither strength nor endurance. 

What really seems to have happened is that 
the muscular tissues that they retained became 
more efficient. Tests in the respiratory calori- 



How Much to Eat 



meter showed that they were able to perform a 
given amount of physical labor with a smaller 
consumption of oxygen, which means that less 
food substance was oxidized or consumed. The 
physical engine actually became more efficient, 
and turned out more labor per pound of "human 
coal." 

This extremely restricted diet was not, how- 
ever, without certain effects which many people 
would consider undesirable. For instance, the 
rate of the heart beat was distinctly lowered ; the 
circulation being slower, the skin temperature 
was slightly reduced, and the men complained 
of being chilly and were obliged to dress more 
warmly. The blood pressure was also lowered, 
a thing which most physicians consider an indi- 
cation of health improvement. 

On the whole, we may summarize the findings 
of these extremely interesting experiments by 
saying that the body has the power to adjust 
itself to various food quantities or nutritive 
levels. While the usual result of excessive eat- 
ing is obesity, yet it is apparent that one may eat 
more than he needs and yet not get fat ; he mere- 
ly disposes of the extra food by using it waste- 
fully. From such overeating the rate of the heart 
beat and respiration are increased so that more 
food fuel is oxidized with the production of an 

99 



Eating foe Health and Stkength 

excess of body heat — a very convincing argu- 
ment in favor of a light diet during hot weather. 
With the larger quantities of food the body sim- 
ply runs at higher pressure ; all physiological ac- 
tivities are speeded up or more extravagantly 
conducted. 

Just how much benefit or harm may come 
either from this higher pressure living or the 
physiologically more efficient low pressure living 
is not so easily determined. Of this, however, 
we have convincing proof: minimum eating is 
not immediately harmful, nor is there any danger 
or loss of efficiency from a reduction of weight 
somewhat below the amount usually carried, even 
of the athletic type. 

An experiment of a few months' duration 
proves but little as to the long run effects that 
might occur from the same conditions maintained 
for a life-time. Upon this subject we will take 
up some interesting facts in our chapter: "The 
Diet in Old Age." 

From all scientific data now available, as well 
as from practical observation, I would say that 
the most nearly ideal dietary standards of food 
quantities would be midway between the old At- 
water standards and the minimum figures at- 
tained in Dr. Benedict's experiments. This 
should give us a figure of about 2,500 calories per 

100 



How Much to Eat 



day for a man of average size at moderate work, 
which is 1,000 calories less than At water's stand- 
ard. 

The dietary figures for women have usually 
been given as eighty per cent of those of men. I 
believe that for the average woman, who takes 
very little exercise and is inclined to be fat, even 
this proportion is too high. For the woman who 
is physically vigorous and active, as she should 
be, the proportion is about correct, which would 
give us a standard of 2,000 calories per day for 
the average woman at moderate work, in the 
place of 2,700 calories, as given in the Atwater 
standard. 

I give these figures only to show clearly the 
changed views on the question of how much to 
eat. In actual practice no dietary standard of 
so many calories per day is of practical use to 
the individual. In the first place the figuring 
up of the calories of one's diet is an unreasonable 
task to impose upon any one but a scientist. In 
the second place, such general standards are 
worthless when applied to an individual case, be- 
cause individual needs vary so widely. The 
chief cause of this variation is the actual size of 
the active body or the weight of muscular tissue, 
and this fact is difficult to determine. The big- 
ger a man is, that is, the more muscle he has, the 

101 



Eating for Health and Strength 

more food he will need, but the heavier, that is, 
the more fat he has, the less food he should eat. 
Lastly, there is no way to tell just what is meant 
by light, heavy, or moderate work. A man may 
feel that he is working very hard, merely because 
of monotonous labor, unpleasant surroundings, 
or mental strain. Another man working pleas- 
antly with a variety of muscular movements may 
seem to be working less hard, though he would 
require more food fuel for his activities. 

There is only one practical method by which to 
gauge the amount of food one should eat; and 
that is by observing the weight of the body and 
one's general feeling as to strength and health. 
The ideal food quantity is that amount which 
will just maintain a feeling of super bodily 
strength and endurance and ideal weight. Here 
again, of course, we are dealing with a standard 
upon which peoples' opinion may differ. Al- 
most any one has a fairly definite conception of 
the ideal form of the human body. With proper 
muscular development this ideal form will, for 
each individual, be a sufficient guide to the ideal 
weight. The practical trouble is that very few 
individuals, under the conditions of modern civil- 
ization, have sufficient muscular development. 

If a lazy, unexercised man, five feet eight 
inches in height takes as his model a perfectly 

102 



How Much to Eat 



developed athlete of the same height who weighs 
one hundred and sixty pounds, and the lazy 
man attempts to attain the athletic weight by 
eating rather than by exercise, the result will 
be a fat and over-fed man. On the other hand, 
should an exceptionally well muscled man reduce 
his food until it resulted in his coming down in 
weight to reach the average figure, it would 
merely mean that he would lose the exceptionally 
fine physique that he had built up. In practice 
there is much less danger of the latter error than 
of the former one. 

The ideal plan is, therefore, to eat just enough 
to maintain a feeling of strength and all around 
vigor and with the body in a well-muscled condi- 
tion and without any visible evidence of surplus 
fat. Even a very slight increase of the body 
weight above this muscular minimum indicates 
over-eating. The condition of the body is usually 
most easily determined by the presence or absence 
of fat on the abdomen. The man in first-class 
physical condition has no more fat upon his 
"stomach" than he has on his arm, and the form 
of the abdominal muscles may be felt beneath 
the skin as readily as the biceps. Few men main- 
tain such fitness, but that is no proof that it can 
not and should not be maintained. Most men 
do over-eat and under-exercise ; and most men 

103 



Eating foe Health and Strength 

are too fat, and die from ten to twenty years 
before their time because of it. 

The above discussion has been written pri- 
marily from a masculine standpoint. The femi- 
nine form naturally carries less muscle and more 
fatty tissue than the masculine. There are fun- 
damental physiological reasons why this should 
be so. Nature adapted the feminine body to a 
more ready storage of surplus nutrition as a 
preparation for child-bearing. Our ideas of 
feminine beauty also require the presence of more 
fat in the feminine than in the masculine form. 
This ideal of fatness in feminine form was for- 
merly carried to an extreme, which the present 
generation is trying to get away from. The 
modern woman wishes to be "slender," yet even 
her ideal of slenderness usually means a compara- 
tively fat condition, because of the lack of muscu- 
lar development. The true ideal of feminine 
form is only maintained by the athletic type of 
woman, and a form maintained by over-eating 
instead of by proper exercise is not a true or 
lasting form of beauty. 

Those who are obviously under-weight or over- 
weight will find their problem most thoroughly 
discussed in later chapters. For the individual 
who is of approximate normal weight I suggest 
an experimental cutting down of the amount of 

104 



How Much to Eat 



food eaten until it results in a loss of from five to 
ten pounds of weight. Such an experiment will 
do you no harm and you may find that it will 
produce a marked benefit in health and efficiency 
as well as in food economy. In such cutting 
down of food quantities, as in reducing from 
obesity, it should be the starches and fats that are 
eliminated. Indeed, if you have been living 
upon the conventional diet, almost invariably too 
rich in the fat-forming foods, you are likely to 
find that the adoption of the type of diet advo- 
cated in this book will result in some loss of 
weight without any conscious effort on your part 
to reduce the food quantity. If so, be reassured 
that this loss of weight will prove beneficial. 



105 



CHAPTER VIII 
When and How to Eat 

A S a practical means of controlling the quan- 
tity of food, the number of meals per day is 
very important. 

The conventional custom of three meals a day 
is purely an arbitrary one. Natural man proba- 
bly ate when he found food, if for no other rea- 
son than to keep the other fellows from getting 
more than their share. As civilization developed 
and acquired definite occupations, he adopted 
the habit of regular meals. 

The number of meals per day is probably of 
less importance than the amount of food eaten. 
A man can over-eat on two meals, but he is far 
less likely to do so than on the three-meal 
plan. This fact was absolutely demonstrated 
by an investigation conducted by the Physical 
Culture Magazine. A number of individuals 
and families agreed to experiment upon the 
three-meal versus the two-meal plan. Nothing 
was suggested to these voluntary experimenters 
as to the total quantity of food they should eat, 
but all were asked to keep a record on their total 

106 



When and How to Eat 



food purchases for comparison under the two 
competing plans. 

In this investigation it was learned that the 
adoption of the two-meal a day habit almost in- 
variably resulted in a considerable cutting down 
in the total quantity of food eaten. The 
amount eaten per meal, however, averaged a 
little more, the reduction of total food on the 
two-meal plan being about twenty per cent, 
whereas had the individual meals remained of 
the same size it would have been a thirty-three 
per cent reduction. This twenty per cent reduc- 
tion of food quantity achieved by the two-meal 
plan resulted in a general improvement of health 
and vigor. There were a number of cases of a 
loss in weight on the part of individuals who had 
been over-weight. It is probable that the others 
also lost some weight, but in too small amounts 
to be noted and reported. 

The only experimenters who were not enthusi- 
astic about the two-meal plan were those who 
were occupied at heavy manual labor. Al- 
though there may be exceptions in either case, I 
believe it is a very safe principle to advocate 
three meals a day for manual laborers and for 
growing children. For adult brain-workers the 
two-meal plan is almost invariably an advantage. 
To say nothing of the physiological benefits, the 

107 



Eating for Health and Strength 

two-meal habit is worth while as an economy of 
food and time — most of all as an economy of 
labor for the housewife. 

Where the family contains manual workers or 
children, three meals should, of course, be served ; 
adult brain-workers in such families could either 
skip one meal, or if they feel this to be an outrage 
of the conventional family life, they may com- 
promise by eating lightly at the first two meals 
of the day. 

The general habit of city dwellers of having 
the heavy meal or "dinner" in the evening seems 
to be correct, Not only is the food digested bet- 
ter when one is resting, but both muscular and 
mental work is better performed when one is not 
digesting. The American farmer calls his mid- 
day meal "dinner," and presumably it is the heavy 
meal of the day. A man who gets up with the 
sun can certainly work up an appetite by twelve 
o'clock. None the less, over-eating at the noon 
meal, followed by immediate return to heavy 
labor, is not the best plan. The farmer puts in 
the longest hours of work of any type of worker, 
and it is unreasonable to expect him to subsist 
on a grape fruit and shredded wheat breakfast 
and a salad luncheon. Such a plan would merely 
mean that he would have to gorge himself at 
night. For the farm family I would, therefore, 

108 



When and How to Eat 



advocate moderate breakfasts and noon meals 
and a slightly heavier evening meal. 

The city manual laborer should follow the 
same general plan with a somewhat greater pro- 
portion of his food for the evening meal, for the 
reason that he has leisure then to digest his food, 
whereas the farmer's hours are often completely 
filled with work until bedtime. 

The brain- worker may omit either breakfast or 
luncheon altogether, or he may gain the same 
effect by taking a very light breakfast and a very 
light luncheon, and in either case not "eating his 
fill" until after his work for the day is over. 

Where digestion is slow and imperfect a hearty 
evening meal is sometimes unsatisfactory. Espe- 
cially if you can not sleep or if you wake up 
during the night or in the morning with a sour 
or nasty taste in your mouth. Under such cir- 
cumstances it is better to eat your hearty meal 
at noon or in the morning, though if a hearty 
breakfast is eaten, it is usually better to go to 
bed hungry if your digestion is not over strong. 

Here is a simple meal plan that I have recent- 
ly been following myself and which I have found 
eminently satisfactory. 

I take only one full meal a day. I have no 
exacting rules or regulations as to the quantity 
of this meal. It is what is commonly called a 

109 



Eating for Health and Strength 

"square meal." In other words I eat all I want 
to, and do not concern myself about restricting 
the quantity. 

The other two meals are very simple indeed. 
One is composed of one or two oranges; the other 
of nuts and raisins, which must be well masticated 
and eaten slowly, and with which there is little 
danger of over-eating. When these two simple 
meals are so restricted there is little danger of 
over-eating for the day, no matter what the na- 
ture of the foods eaten in the full meal. 

Whatever the meal plan followed, the idea 
that absolute regularity is the most important of 
all eating virtues is an illusion and often a very 
harmful one. It is far better to eat irregularly 
than to eat regularly without appetite. When 
one is particularly over-wrought or over-worked, 
eating frequently does more harm than good. 
Strength from food does not come immediately 
after it is eaten ; on the other hand, the process of 
digestion temporarily subtracts from the vital 
energy that would otherwise be available for 
work. 

Just as monotonous foods will cloy the ap- 
petite so monotonous regularity of meals will do 
so. It is far better to skip the meal entirely than 
to eat it if it is not fully enjoyed. Proper ap- 
petite or enjoyment of food is essential to prop- 
no 



When and How to Eat 



er digestion. Hasty eating is injurious, both 
because one does not enjoy food so eaten and 
because of the lack of mastication. 

When it does not exist naturally, stimulating 
the appetite by highly seasoned food is an abom- 
ination — and an abomination all too frequently 
practised upon those "enjoying ill health." The 
subject of fasting as a curative agency I will not 
take up in this book more than to say that fast- 
ing is nature's remedy against over-eating and 
the consequent accumulation of surplus food and 
waste elements in the body — and that fasting is 
the one sure cure for loss of appetite. 

The adaptation of the diet to the climate and 
the season of the year is of considerable impor- 
tance in maintaining efficiency, health and com- 
fort. Over-eating is at all times a favdt, but it 
is particularly so in a warm climate, or in the 
summer-time. 

As pointed out in the last chapter, over-eating 
increases the temperature of the body. In fact 
the very act of digesting food creates a measure- 
able amount of heat ; from ten to fifteen per cent 
of energy of food being utilized in its digestion. 
In the case of meat protein there is a stimulating 
effect considerably greater than this figure. 
Tests made upon a fasting dog showed that the 
number of calories oxidized by the dog's body de- 

111 



Eating for Health and Strength 

pended on the temperature of the room and 
ranged from about eighty-five calories per hour 
at a temperature of forty-five degrees, down to 
fifty-five calories per hour at a temperature of 
eighty-five degrees. But the dog, after a heavy 
meal of meat generated as many calories per 
hour, while digesting it in a hot room, as he did 
in a cold room — and had to keep cool, dog fash- 
ion — by panting. In the case of a man the in- 
crease of heat formation in the body from eating 
a pound of meat is about twenty-five per cent. 

In addition to the development of heat in the 
process of digestion there is a further heat de- 
velopment caused by the excessive oxidation of 
food element in the overfed body. A man living 
under a restricted or minimum diet can run a 
foot race or perform other vigorous exercise with- 
out getting so "heated up." This is indeed the 
proper explanation of the greater endurance of 
light eaters. 

Comfort in hot weather, therefore, depends 
upon the cutting of the diet down to the very 
minimum needs. The natural diet of the sum- 
mer should contain a large proportion of fruits 
and succulent vegetables, whereas fats, meats, 
sugars and starches should be greatly reduced. 
In winter these foods may be restored to the 
diet in somewhat larger amounts, but this should 

112 



When and How to Eat 



not be to the exclusion of the leafy veget ables 
and foods of the milk group which are needed at 
all times to supply essential vitamines and min- 
erals. 

Once a meal has been selected, prepared and 
set before us, the two most important factors in 
healthful eating are the enjoyment of the meal 
and the mastication of the food. These two mat- 
ters are closely allied, since food is never really 
enjoyed if it is bolted down without proper mas- 
tication. 

I have already explained the effect of the ap- 
petite and the enjoyment of food upon the secre- 
tion of the digestive juices; likewise we learn 
from similar studies that fear, worry and undue 
excitement, or extreme fatigue seriously interfere 
with the process of digestion. Not only do these 
unhappy emotions check the flow of the diges- 
tive juices, but they may stop the muscular 
movement of the digestive organs. This effect 
has been remarkably demonstrated with the 
X-rays. An insoluble substance that is impervi- 
ous to the X-rays is mixed with the food of a 
small animal like a cat, whose body is then ob- 
served in an X-ray chamber. After such an 
experimental cat has become used to the cham- 
ber, the process of digestion is resumed and the 
pulsing peristaltic movement of the alimentary 

113 



Eating for Health and Strength 

tract may be plainly seen. Now, if the cat be 
frightened by some unearthly noise, immediately 
all movement of the stomach and the intestinal 
muscles come to a dead stop. 

But to command a person to enjoy his food 
will not cause him to do so. Enjoyment of food 
is a problem one must work out for himself as far 
as the condition of the mind is concerned. The 
more strictly dietetic factors in this matter of 
appetite or food enjoyment are: First, true 
appetite or hunger, which can only be regained 
when it has been lost, by either decreasing the 
amount of food, or increasing the amount of bod- 
ily exercise until there is a true physiological 
need of food. Second, the foods must be so 
prepared and served that they will be attractive. 
This question of the attractiveness of food is 
largely a matter of habit. Those who have been 
addicted to over-eating and the use of highly 
seasoned dishes can only regain the appetite for 
simple foods by going without all food until 
genuine hunger is re-established. Any artificial 
appetite which enables one to enjoy a food be- 
yond the body's true needs is an acquired or 
harmful appetite, like the appetite for alcohol or 
tobacco. 

The simplification of the diet by reducing the 
number of foods eaten at one meal, and by the 

114 



When and How to Eat 



serving of such food in the elementary form with 
a very simple combination of dishes will do much 
to revive true food instincts, so that the appetite 
will again become a natural guide as to both the 
quality and the quantity of food required. 

Thorough mastication is also of great help in 
the establishing of a true, instinctive appetite. 
Natural foods have their own flavors, but these 
flavors are only fully brought out by a thorough 
mastication and the full tasting of the food. 

There is no food which should be swallowed 
without mastication, or, in the case of liquid 
foods, the natural insalivation which is accom- 
plished by moving them about in the mouth until 
they are thoroughly mixed with the saliva and 
swallowed by instinctive motion rather than 
by voluntary gulping. This effect may be very 
readily noted in the case of milk. Milk may be 
drunk outright, as is water, but such drinking 
of milk or other liquid food is not correct; it 
should be sipped slowly and swallowed instinc- 
tively. 

The more nearly you can approximate the 
suckling baby in taking your milk the better it 
will digest. The proper way to "eat" milk is to 
place the lips to a glass of milk, and make the 
opening between them so small that you have 
to make quite an effort to "suck in" the milk. 

115 



Eating for Health and Strength 

This pressure forces more saliva into the mouth 
and gives the milk a flavor that can not be se- 
cured when one merely drinks it. 

It is quite possible to acquire the habit of 
masticating foods that have already been milled 
and cooked until their mastication is a sort of 
empty performance like boxing with a ghost. 
This, indeed, was the distinctive feature of 
Horace Fletcher's eating habits. However, it 
seems to me that the more sensible procedure is 
to adopt foods in their more natural forms so 
that the act of mastication has some resistance 
to work against. The average foods in man's 
natural diet were neither as hard and gritty as 
dry whole grain, nor were they as soft and sub- 
stanceless as cornstarch pudding. Nut meats 
and tender leaves and vegetables are about the 
degrees of firmness to which man's teeth and 
chewing powers seem to be adapted. Grains to 
be reduced to like degree of masticability require 
some softening. Rolled whole grains or firm 
whole wheat bread are in a form that seems well 
adapted to man's chewing powers. The same 
is true of the general run of vegetables. When 
foods are softened beyond these stages it will re- 
quire a conscious effort to chew them more than 
their mechanical condition really requires, if the 
process of mastication is not to fall below the 

116 



When and How to Eat 



amount needed to bring out the proper flow 
of digestive juices and a sufficient slowness of 
eating. 

Of all food substances the danger of lack of 
mastication is greatest in the case of starchy 
foods and nut-meats, the former requiring a thor- 
ough admixture of saliva for their digestion; for 
this reason all forms of starchy gruels or por- 
ridges are less desirable than firm breads or gran- 
ular cereals. In the case of nuts, thorough chew- 
ing is necessary because the nut meats will not 
digest well unless they are finely divided. Pulpy 
fruit juices in which sugar is the main ingredient 
require the least mastication of any food. Natural 
sugars are already in a form to be absorbed by 
the blood and hence require practically no di- 
gestion. Eut even in this case there is no evidence 
that mastication is of any harm and the better 
rule is to masticate all food thoroughly. 

Mastication is also a very good remedy against 
over-eating. The act of mastication and the 
thorough tasting of food result in the full se- 
cretion not only of saliva, but, by the sympathetic 
nerve coordination of the glands, the secretions 
of the stomach are also influenced. Under these 
proper conditions the appetite is normally satis- 
fied and the instinctive warning to cease eating is 
given us when we have eaten enough food to 

117 



Eating for Health and Strength 

meet the body's true requirements. But when 
foods are hopelessly mixed up in cookery, over- 
seasoned and ground and mushed until no chew- 
ing is required, and then bolted down, the effect 
of the whole process is to confuse and destroy 
all instinctive appetite. As a result, the person 
eating in this fashion does not know when to quit 
and often does not quit eating until warned to 
do so by the painful stretching of the walls of the 
stomach, or perhaps by the limitations of the 
girth of his belt. 



118 



CHAPTER IX 

Food Production; Manufacturing and 
Marketing 

IXa book devoted to practical advice on eating, 
A we can not attempt to give any encyclopedic 
information regarding the production, manufac- 
ture, and marketing of food. Such facts as I 
note in this chapter are, therefore, given because 
they throw light on the more immediate personal 
food problem, or suggest industrial changes that 
any one interested in food reform would do well 
to comprehend and advocate. 

As pointed out briefly in Chapter V, the pres- 
ent diet of mankind is not the result of following 
either the dictates of natural food instincts, or of 
any recent and scientific plan for the proper 
nourishment of the human race. Man made his 
conquest of the world and became the dominant 
species because of his ability to adapt himself 
to changes in diet and his ingenuity in increasing 
his food supply. As we see the world in its 
present state, both the kind of food and the 
amount of food produced are subject to the 
economic laws of supply and demand. 

119 



Eating for Health and Strength 

In other words, food is at present produced 
for profit, and the farmer or food manufacturer 
gives us such food as he finds we will pay the 
most for in proportion to its cost of production. 
If the foods so provided for us are not tne 
best that might be provided, it is because we 
will not demand and pay for better ones. 

The chief criticism that the food reformer, in- 
terested in the health and efficiency of the race, 
has of the present system of food production is 
that it gives us an over-supply of foods derived 
from grains and from the flesh of cattle and 
swine. This overproduction of grains and meat, 
which is the fault of the entire modern scheme 
of world food production, is exaggerated in the 
United States. This is due to the fact that this 
country is still comparatively sparsely populated. 
We wrested from the few roving Indians their 
vast hunting ground and found it to be the richest 
of the world's productive lands. The easiest 
way to mine this store of fertility, accumulated 
through vast geological ages, was to crop the 
land with the grains or graze it with cattle. So 
we have cereals and meat in abundance, and in 
the matter of food quantity the United States 
is the best fed nation on earth. But our system 
of food production is not the best suited for de- 
veloping human efficiency, nor is it the most 

120 



Food Production 



economical and efficient way to support mankind 
from the soil. 

Grains yield a comparatively large amount of 
starchy fuel food with comparatively little labor, 
but the cropping of the ground with fruits, nuts 
and vegetables will yield more total food and far 
more varied and wholesome food. One has but 
to observe the corn plant in comparison with 
lettuce or cabbage to appreciate the waste of 
grain production. The stalk of corn, with its 
abundant foliage, is a rank and luxuriant grow- 
ing plant from which we merely shuck the seed 
ear — the corn's provisional store for the next 
generation of the plant — and discard as human 
food the bulky remainder from the plant. 

Though the leafy corn fodder finds some use 
in feeding animals, the stalk is not even used for 
that purpose. Worse yet, the great bulk of the 
grain crop of corn is not used as human food, 
but is also fed to animals. Agricultural author- 
ities, in America at least, assume this to be a 
proper form of husbandry. It is a profitable 
form merely because it is less laborious than more 
intensive agriculture required for the direct pro- 
duction of the human food from the soil — and 
also because we, as a comparatively wealthy na- 
tion, can afford to eat the meat and pay for it. 
We also thought until recently we could afford 

121 



Eating for Health and Stkength 

a similar waste of food substance in the produc- 
tion of alcohol. The inference that meat is as 
harmful as alcohol is an exaggeration; but meat 
is certainly physiologically of less worth than the 
better varieties of vegetables; and, economically, 
the production of meat involves a total waste of 
human food producing capacity of the soil many 
times greater than the former waste in the pro- 
duction of alcohol. 

As calculated by the United States Food Ad- 
ministration, the total amount of human food 
consumed per year in the United States is 130 
millions of millions of calories. But the total 
amount of food substances consumed by farm 
animals is 686 millions of millions of calories, 
or five times as much! If we had no animals we 
could support five times as many people ! Allow- 
ing for the food eaten by horses, dairy cows and 
laying hens, we can safely say that meat produc- 
tion alone halves our available human food 
supply. 

The ratio of waste of nutritive substance in the 
feeding of plant foods to animals varies with the 
kind of meat or other animal products produced. 
It takes about ten or twelve plant food units to 
produce one food unit in the form of beef. The 
ratio of waste in the production of mutton is 
nearly as great, though it has in its favor not 

122 



Food Pkoduction 



only the great human utility of the production 
of wool, but also sheep (and goats) which are the 
most capable of all animals of existing in arid or 
barren regions. Swine are much more efficient in 
retaining the energy value of food, requiring 
only about four or five plant food units to pro- 
duce one food unit in animal form, but most of 
this extra energy is in the form of lard. In both 
beef and pork production the waste is inexcusa- 
ble, not only because of the loss of the food sub- 
stance, but because there is no nutritional superi- 
ority in the quality of the products so wastefully 
produced. 

The dairy industry stands in an entirely differ- 
ent class. The dairy cow is the most efficient of 
all animals in this matter of food conversion, 
requiring only about four units of plant food 
substance to produce one food unit of milk. Still 
more to the credit of the cow is the fact that her 
product has a decidedly higher nutritional worth 
than the plant foods from which the milk is pro- 
duced. While the human race can exist without 
the use of milk and its products, there is no 
known diet as efficient as the lacto-vegetarian 
for the nutrition of the race and particularly for 
the nutrition of children. 

The production of eggs by hens specially bred 
for that purpose, while net as efficient as the 

123 



Eating for Health and Strength 

production of milk, is more efficient than the 
production of beef; and like milk, eggs are a 
food of superior nutritional value. 

In the case of both dairying and egg produc- 
tion there is a meat by-product that man. with 
his meat loving appetite, will never have the 
extravagance to waste. Uninformed city people 
may be under the impression that beef produc- 
tion and dairying are merely two halves of one 
industry; this is not the case; the majority of 
our beef comes from the beef breeds of cattle 
which produce but little milk other than that used 
for the calves. In well specialized dairy farming 
the only meat produced is from the young male 
calves and the cows that have served many 
efficient years as milk producers. Such a meat 
production, even with an increased milk produc- 
tion, will be far less than our present output, and 
the total nutritional waste involved will be much 
less. The hog could be eliminated from our 
civilization with no loss to mankind. The chief 
use of this animal has been the production of fat, 
and in America we have an abundant source of 
food fat in economical cotton-seed oil. More- 
over, the growth of the world's nut crops and 
other oil producing plants, as well as the desira- 
ble increase in the production of butter fat, would 
permit of the elimination of lard from our diet. 

124 



Food Production 



We would not be much better off in matters 
of food quality if we merely attempted to utilize 
as human food the grains now wasted in meat 
production. This change would indeed increase 
the total quantity of food and enable America, 
now producing scarcely enough to feed her own 
population, again to contribute abundantly to 
the feeding of other and less fortunately situated 
people. 

But it is not the mere utilization of these foods 
now wasted on animals that is needed, but rather 
the use of our fertile land to produce a better 
quality of human food directly from the soil. 
The most efficient method of converting the soil 
fertility and the sun's energy into human food, 
is in the production of quick-growing, tender 
vegetables, all, or nearly all, of the substance of 
which may be consumed by man. In the case 
of fruit and nut crops, it is true that we consume 
but a small portion of the plant; but that seem- 
ing inefficiency is largely overcome by the fact 
that the fruit or nut tree stands for many years ; 
hence the bulk of the plant is not wasted each 
season, but, like the body of the dairy cow, it is 
maintained year after year as a comparatively 
efficient instrument for producing a high quality 
food crop. Moreover, the roots of trees go 
deeper into the soil and utilize fertility that 

125 



Eating for Health and Strength 

can not be reached by shallow growing annual 
plants. 

It is to our vegetable gardens, to our orchards, 
our dairy herds and our laying flocks of hens that 
we must look for our most physiologically effi- 
cient and economically efficient sources of food. 
But these industries do require a higher order 
of intelligent husbandry, a relatively greater 
amount of skilled labor, and a greater degree of 
foresight for the future than do the cruder and 
more wasteful forms of skimming the cream of 
nature's stored fertility by the grazing of animals 
and the cropping of grains. The man who en- 
gages in, or encourages any of these more effi- 
cient food producing industries, is a benefactor 
to the human race as certainly as the man who 
founds a library, or makes a labor-saving inven- 
tion. 

The question of the marketing of foods is one 
that more immediately concerns the consumer 
than do these fundamental problems of food 
production. The concentration of such a large 
portion of our population in the cities results in 
a great economic waste in the evil necessity of 
feeding such population upon foods produced 
on comparatively distant soil. Unfortunately 
this cause of waste is the greatest in the case of 
the best quality of foods; milk, eggs and fresh 

126 



Food Production 



fruits and vegetables are both bulky and perish- 
able ; hence the process of getting them from the 
farms to the cities is expensive, and, what is 
worse, too often results in a loss of freshness and 
deterioration of quality. 

It is a painful fact for the city consumer that 
the price he must pay for fresh milk or vegetables 
is more than double — sometimes quadruple — the 
price that the producer receives for them. The 
middleman is usually blamed for this seeming 
outrage. As a matter of fact, the middleman, 
that is, the jobber or wholesaler, deals in food 
products in large units and his profits per quart 
or pound are not much of a tax on the price the 
consumer pays. It is rather the cost of gather- 
ing these food products from their scattered 
sources, and, even more, the expensive process of 
their retail distribution and delivery in the city 
that piles up the cost. The entire scheme of food 
marketing is complex and confused, and no 
remedy has as yet been found that will entirely 
overcome the obvious wastes. Co-operated mar- 
keting by the producers is making rapid strides 
and doing something to solve the problem, but 
the chief financial benefits probably go to the 
producer rather than to the consumer. More- 
over, it is at the consumer's end that the costs pile 
up most rapidly. What may be done to relieve 

127 



Eating for Health and Strength 



the situation, in the way of co-operated buying 
by the consumers, public marketing enterprises, 
or direct marketing by parcels post from the 
producer to the consumer, remains to be seen. 
As an individual problem there is only one 
sweeping remedy for this high cost of food mar- 
keting and that is to get out of the city and get 
back to the land, or at least to the small commu- 
nity in direct connection with the land. Those 
who are in a position to make this change without 
the loss of earning powers can certainly solve 
the cost of living problem. Moreover, if they 
will use intelligence, they can improve the qual- 
ity of the diet. 

While the country is the place where the best 
food may be had, it is unfortunately not always 
true that farmers are the best nourished. Igno- 
rance and shiftlessness is the explanation. Many 
farm families are content to eat a few fresh vege- 
tables or fruits in season and to live the rest of 
the year on pork, white flour and potatoes. The 
fact that the food they grow is relatively cheap 
makes them disinclined to buy vegetables, fruits, 
nuts from distant markets; or, if they do buy 
them, they get only the poor quality of com- 
mercially canned or dried products. 

A family living in the country should by all 
means use an abundance of eggs and milk which 

128 



Food Production 



may be had by their own labors or be purchased 
from the neighbors at half the price the city con- 
sumers pay. Vegetable and fruit gardens should 
likewise be developed to their fullest possibilities, 
and the crops planted for a steady supply from 
the first growth of "greens" in the spring to the 
late fall crops of winter-keeping fruits and vege- 
tables. For the months when fresh garden and 
orchard products are not available the farmer 
should preserve an abundance of canned or dried 
fruit or vegetables. Though such practice is not 
widely known, the exceedingly important leafy 
vegetables or greens may be dried or desiccated 
and so preserved for winter use. In warm and 
dry countries this may be accomplished by sun- 
drying, while in damp or cooler regions a simple 
desiccator may be constructed by any handy man, 
and all manner of fruit and vegetables, including 
greens, may be admirably preserved by drying. 
Another way in which the farmer, or dweller 
in farm regions may very readily improve the 
quality of the diet, and at the same time achieve 
great economy, is by the use of whole grains. 
Chief among these is wheat. No better cereal 
food has ever been invented than whole boiled 
wheat. When the cooking is started the day 
oefore, and the grain allowed to soak the whole 
night in warm water, or the wheat is left for sev- 

129 



Eating fok Health and Strength 

eral hours in a nreless cooker, whole wheat be- 
comes delicious. Ground coarsely in any rough 
mill, wheat makes a cereal food that may be more 
quickly cooked. The same grinding process, 
with the mill set firmer, produces the only genu- 
ine whole wheat or Graham flour. 

Whole corn hominy is another excellent and 
exceedingly cheap food, available to anyone who 
can procure clean, high quality corn. Corn must 
be boiled a long time to become palatable. Be- 
cause the outer thin bran of corn is quite tough 
and also because of the presence of a wood tip 
where it joins the cob, the pioneers developed 
the process of making lye hominy. It is made 
by cooking the corn in lye water for several hours. 
Then the thin outer skin and the hard woody tip 
may be easily rubbed off. The rich, oily germ is 
retained. The corn must be soaked for many 
hours, preferably in running water until all trace 
of the lye has been removed. The chemically 
inclined reader can make this product by boiling 
the corn in caustic soda and washing out most of 
the alkali and neutralizing the remainder with 
hydrochloric acid, until it is neutral to litmus 
paper. The only chemical then left in the corn 
is a little common salt. 

In commercial corn milling not only the outer 
bran and tip are removed, but the large germ,. 

130 



Food Peoductiox 



rich in oil, vitamines, and minerals, is also dis- 
carded. Freshly ground whole grain corn meal 
is decidedly superior to this commercial product. 
The fresher the corn the better. One of the most 
tasty of cereal foods is grated corn meal made 
from ear corn picked just before the grain hard- 
ens. The new crop corn even when hard enough 
to. grind is of nearly equal flavor. Only those 
who have tasted corn meal mush or corn bread 
made of such meal can realize the relative in- 
feriority of the commercial corn meal made of 
old dried corn and from which the germ has 
been entirely removed. 

These superior whole grain food products are 
not so available to the city man. Whole or 
cracked wheat can sometimes be purchased in 
town, and genuine whole wheat flour and also 
so-called water-ground or whole grain corn-meal 
are in the market if one has the persistency to 
search them out and refuse the inferior substances 
offered by the millers. 

The question of the preservation of food is im- 
portant both from the standpoint of economy 
and wholesomeness. It would be better if we 
could partake of all foods in the freshest possible 
condition. In such a state, foods are not only 
more palatable, but in the various processes of 
preservation some of the vital qualities may be 

131 



Eating fob Health and Strength 

actually lost. Still worse, in some of the many 
manufactured foods harmful or poisonous chemi- 
cals may be added. 

This latter evil, which was once very serious, 
has been abated of recent years by pure food 
legislation. Some of the milder preservatives 
are, however, still legally permissible, whereas 
the old-fashioned methods of preservation by 
salting, vinegar pickling, spicing and smoking 
never came under the ban of the law. Any such 
chemical method of food preservation degrades 
the quality of the food as well as adding to it, if 
the preservatives are not removed, an unnatural 
and harmful substance. We do not ordinarily 
think of salt and vinegar as "chemicals/ ' but it 
is the writer's belief that used in excess these 
old-fashioned preservatives are quite as harmful 
as some of the strange, new chemicals, such as 
benzoate of soda, which frighten the housewife 
more because her grandmother did not use them. 

Other than chemicals, there are three methods 
of preserving foods: The first of these is the 
application of heat, followed by sealing in air- 
tight containers; the second is the continuous 
application of cold, or what is familiarly known 
as cold storage; lastly, there is the process of 
removing all water by drying or desiccating. 

The preservation of foods by heating and can- 

132 



Food Production 



ning ordinarily does no more harm than the 
process of cooking; however, either process de- 
stroys some of the vitamines, hence a diet having 
no fresh or uncooked fruits and vegetables is 
inferior to one in which these foods are available 
only in the form of canned goods. 

Cold storage is really one of the best methods 
of preserving food, if the foods are of such 
nature that they are not injured by freezing. 
Little if any decay can go on in frozen food. 
The prejudice against cold storage foods is partly 
an economic one, the consumer believing that 
the storage man buys the food cheaply in seasons 
of plenty and holds it until the season of scarcity 
and high prices. Of course, there is something 
to be said on the other side, as it costs money to 
run a cold storage warehouse, and the food specu- 
lator has to take his chances on occasional losses. 
The most important objection to storage food 
is that many of them are stored without freezing, 
and hence slowly decompose, sometimes develop- 
ing ptomaine poisons in the process. Fortu- 
nately, the present laws demand that the cold 
storage food be sold as such, and the particular 
consumer may avoid them if he wishes. 

The preservation of food by proper drying or 
desiccation is the least expensive and least ob- 
jectionable method that can be used. As a mat- 

133 



Eating for Health and Strength 

ter of fact many of our foods, such as nuts and 
grains, are naturally desiccated. Dates, raisins 
and other evaporated fruits are a wholesome and 
palatable form of desiccated food. Practically 
all fruits and vegetables may be desiccated; even 
milk, with proper facilities, can be reduced to a 
dry powder which retains nearly all of the qual- 
ities of fresh milk. 

No form of preservation ever improves food, 
but the canning and desiccating processes do 
little harm other than the occasional loss of the. 
fresh flavor. By all means use fresh foods at 
all seasons when they can be had at reasonable 
prices, but it is wiser to use the better forms of 
preserved foods than to omit essential foods or 
food ingredients from the diet. 

The manufacture of food has, under our pres- 
ent industrial system, been developed to a wholly 
unnecessary degree. For the most part foods 
do not need manufacturing, but commercial in- 
stinct here steps in and finds some way to make 
a, profit by grinding, mixing, pre-digesting and 
processing food. If the resulting product is 
something new or strange of appearance, or arti- 
ficially flavored, the clever manufacturer is able 
to foist it on the public as something superior, 
and sell it at a sufficiently advanced price to make 
a profit thereby. As a matter of fact few manu- 

134 



Food Production 



factured foods are in any way superior to the 
natural food ingredients out of which they are 
made; and in many instances are decidedly in- 
ferior. Complicated manufacture of foods per- 
mits of disguising the original nature of the 
ingredients and hence encourages the use of 
inferior material. 

Perhaps the greatest of all evils of food manu- 
facturing is the refining and denaturing of cereal 
products, an evil which I have already had occa- 
sion to mention several times in this book. The 
absurd part of the situation is that all such re- 
fining is expensive both because of the cost of 
the process and because of the discarding of part 
of the ingredients. The public has itself to blame 
for all this because it has demanded the uneco- 
nomical and inferior products. Today one is 
often charged more for whole wheat flour than 
for white flour, for the simple reason that there 
is not enough demand for the former to induce 
the miller to make it and the grocer to sell it at 
a reasonable price. The situation is still worse 
in the case of unground whole wheat which, 
though worth but two or three cents a pound, 
can either not be purchased at all in the cities, 
or if purchased, is sold for from two to ten times 
its value. 



135 



CHAPTER X 

The Home Preparation of Food 

T? NTIRELY too much time and entirely too 
-*-^ little intelligence is ordinarily expended on 
the home preparation of food, or to use the more 
ordinary word "cooking." 

Cooking, as a matter of fact, is a wholly arti- 
ficial process for which no argument can be found 
in nature. Cooking was originally adopted by 
man as a means of rendering grain and meat 
more palatable. Raw dry grains are too hard 
and too dry for any creature to eat unless pro- 
vided with heavy molars, or a gizzard full of 
sharp rocks, for grinding purposes. 

It is commonly taught in cook books that raw 
starch is indigestible. This is a fallacy. Farm 
animals fed experimentally on cooked grain do 
not digest it as well as the raw grain. This 
evidence may be rebutted by stating that man 
has been a cooking animal so long that his di- 
gestive system is no longer adapted to raw foods. 
This argument, however, is not correct, as has 
been proven by experimental tests. A man can 
digest practically all kinds of food raw, including 

136 



The Home Preparation of Food 

cereal starch. Cooking, therefore, is not to be 
defended on hygienic grounds, except in so far 
as the cooking of food may render it more 
palatable. 

Meats might be cited as an exception to this* 
or for that matter so might any dirty or con- 
taminated food, on the ground that cooking is 
needed as a sterilizing process. I certainly do 
not advocate the eating of raw meat, chiefly 
because the idea is repulsive to me, as it is to 
most civilized people. Moreover, animal para- 
sites may find entrance to the body through the 
consumption of raw meat. Even the consump- 
tion of raw oysters may lead to typhoid fever„ 
if the oysters are from sewage-polluted water. 

Just as the heating of food is necessary to kill 
germs of decay when preserved by canning, sa 
cooking is recommended to kill disease germs. 
The fear of disease germs is nine-tenths non- 
sense; even those who painstakingly sterilize 
much of their food eat freely of lettuce and 
similar raw vegetables that have been exposed 
to the germ-laden air of the city streets. The 
germ-hunting doctors may some time get so tied 
up what with laws and fears that everything 
we eat will come in sterilized capsules. Until 
that time arrives I propose to continue to eat my 
fruit and vegetables and dairy products without 

137 



Eating for Health and Strength 

sterilization, provided that I can get them in a 
reasonably fresh and cleanly state. 

Every diet should contain at least some por- 
tion of uncooked foods. Although scientists have 
not fully settled the matter, the evidence at pres- 
ent indicates that the vitamines and perhaps 
some of the mineral salts and proteins are ren- 
dered less digestible, or their nutritive attributes 
destroyed by cooking. At least we know, as a 
practical proposition, that the addition to the 
diet of raw milk or milk and eggs and un- 
cooked fruits and vegetables frequently results in 
marked benefits. 

Grain products can be eaten raw, in fact, raw 
rolled wheat, rye and barley eaten with milk and 
raisins form excellent cereal dishes. Raw rolled 
oats is also edible, when one learns to like the 
flavor, and is certainly as digestible as the pasty, 
mushy mass usually made by cooking the same 
material. Perhaps the best forms in which to 
prepare grains — all things considered — is a form 
of cooking that leaves the grains whole so that 
they still require some mastication, as boiled 
wheat, whole corn hominy and rice cooked 
Chinese fashion. 

Ground grains may be used as porridges, but 
in the case of the resulting ' mush" there is al- 
ways the temptation to bolt the food, whereas, 

138 



The Home Preparation of Food 

being a starchy food, there is, particularly, need 
of mastication. For that reason it is much better 
to use cereals in the whole grain forms or to make 
them into bread. The effort to get bread that 
is so soft and delicate and that "melts in the 
mouth" without chewing is a mistake. This 
lightness and softness of white flour bread is a 
fault almost as grave as its chemical deficiencies. 
Many people object to genuine whole wheat 
bread on the ground that it is too coarse and 
hard; they are too lazy to chew it; such people 
would also object to taking exercise. If they 
carried their objection to the labor of living to a 
logical end, they should be put on a feather bed 
and fed gruel with a hose. Doubtless on this 
system of living they would become nice and 
plump like a goose stuffed with noodles — the 
goose gets fat and also develops an enormous 
liver which is used for the making of pate de foie 
gras. 

It is possible in many of the large cities and 
in a few of the small ones to buy an honest whole 
wheat bread. But in the majority of American 
cities and towns it is difficult to secure the genuine 
article. Almost anything is called Graham 
bread — any cheap mixture of poor white flour, 
bran and by-products. In many millions of 
homes, therefore, the only practical solution to 

139 



Eating for Health and Strength 

the problem of securing whole wheat bread is to 
"bake your own." 

The trouble begins with the flour. Whole 
wheat flour should be the most uniformly good 
of all flours, since the process of its making is the 
simplest; but it is often the worst. The correct 
recipe for making whole wheat flour is "Grind 
the wheat." The commercial practice is to 
assemble in one sack various proportions of the 
low priced offal of the white flour milling process 
and sell it for more than the price of the white 
flour. 

These wheat offal compounds will not make 
good bread, not because there is anything wrong 
with the food qualities of the various portions of 
the wheat rejected in the process of white flour 
milling, but because the proportions are wrong 
and the mechanical condition is wrong. The 
usual commercial mixture sold as whole wheat 
flour has too little of both the bran and of the 
interior of the wheat kernel and has too much 
of the middlings and shorts and wheat germs. 
Such a flour is sticky, without possessing suffi- 
cient true gluten, and makes a soggy loaf and 
sometimes a bitter loaf because of the rancidity 
of the oil of the wheat germ that has stood too 
long exposed to the air. 

I have never yet seen a miller's formula for 
140 



The Home Preparation of Food 

making whole wheat flour out of fine flour offals 
that can equal the pure ground whole wheat. 
Part of this fault is mechanical; the fine flour 
milling process rubs the bran to thin, papery 
flakes and grinds the rest of the kernel to impal- 
pable powder. On the contrary, the simple grind- 
ing of wheat in a mill not too finely set results in 
breaking up the kernel into particles of varying 
sizes. The interior portion easily reduces to a 
fine powder, but the outer part breaks up into 
flakes of bran to which adhere the inner bran 
coats and portions of the white meat of the 
kernel; such natural ground wheat with its par- 
ticles of various sizes makes a loaf that is superior 
to that composed of papery bran flakes and other 
ingredients finely powdered. 

The surest way to get good whole wheat 
flour is to get good whole wheat and grind it 
yourself or have it ground. A coffee mill will 
do it — laboriously; the little home mills now hap- 
pily on sale for the purpose will do it faster; an 
ordinary stock food mill such as exists on many 
farms will do it splendidly, and an old water 
mill with its stone burrs will do it to the queen's 
taste. However obtained, the flour should be as 
fresh as possible, that freshly ground from wheat 
of the year's harvesting being the ideal — a thing 
equally true of corn meal. 

141 



Eating for Health and Strength 

Whole-wheat bread without leaven is possible, 
but it is heavy, damp and soggy. White flour 
bread without leaven is "impossible" unless it be 
the completely dried out cracker form. Made 
with soda and sour milk or with the various forms 
of quick chemical leavening, the whole wheat is 
superior to the fine flour. But these various 
forms of gems, cakes and muffins are not bread 
in the strict sense which limits the term to the 
yeast raised loaf that is palatable cold and im- 
proves with a few days' age. 

True yeast breads are frequently judged by 
the degree of their lightness. It is an erroneous 
standard of judgment, for the really best bread, 
even when made of white flour, is not the most 
extremely light and airy loaf. But certain light- 
ness bread must have, or it will be soggy, tough, 
hard and generally unpalatable. Whole-wheat 
bread can be made light enough for palatability 
though the process is difficult and the difficulty 
is increased by the breadmaker having learned 
her art on white flour breads, and attempting 
to apply its procedure to whole-wheat doughs. 

Whole-wheat flour dough will not raise to the 
same degree as white-flour dough, hence, in try- 
ing to attain this end the thing is overdone, the 
dough falls, or, what is worse, bacteria get their 
work in and the dough sours. 

142 



The Home Preparation of Food 

The simplest method of all — I do not say the 
best — is the direct method. Take the usual in- 
gredients, i.e., two cups of milk, scalded and 
cooled, a teaspoonful of salt, a fourth cup of 
sugar or molasses, and a cake of yeast dissolved 
in one-fourth cup of warm water, and mix with 
enough whole-wheat flour to form a dough as 
thick as can be stirred with a strong arm and a 
stiff wooden spoon. And keep on stirring for 
some time, as there is not going to be any knead- 
ing. Then pour into greased pans, filling them 
half full. Set them to rise in a temperature 
between 75 and 80 degrees. When the dough 
has risen to twice its bulk and so fills the pans, 
put them into an oven hot enough to bake them 
done in one hour. 

This is the simplest method of making yeast 
bread that has been or can be devised. If you 
have failed with more complicated methods, try it. 

Here is a more complex method: Take the 
same ingredients other than flour and set a 
"sponge." For this sponge whole-wheat flour 
may be used, but as the sponge forms only a 
portion of the finished loaf, white flour may be 
used for it and it has the advantage of being 
more glutinous and better holding the gas bub- 
bles. This sponge is a thick batter but not a 
dough. Set the sponge at the same temperature 

143 



Eating for Health and Strength 

above recommended till it rises to twice its bulk. 
Then stir in whole-wheat flour until the dough 
is stiff for kneading. Knead for ten or fifteen 
minutes. Again return to a large vessel and 
permit the dough to raise till it doubles its bulk. 
Then knead a second time, form into loaves and 
put into baking-pans. For the third time set 
the dough now in the pans at the yeast-growing 
temperature. If this were white-flour bread to 
be made as light as possible, the rule would again 
be to let the dough again double its volume. But 
with the whole-wheat this is unattainable and 
our maximum of safety for this last raising is 
fifty per cent increase in bulk, i.e., the pan two- 
thirds full of dough should raise to fullness. 
Then we bake as before. 

This process, if each step is conducted exactly 
right, securing the maximum raising without 
going beyond that point, will give a loaf of 
maximum lightness. But there are three chances 
to go wrong and have sour or soggy bread. 

Hence between these two extremes the ex- 
perienced teacher in bread-making usually rec- 
ommends the following compromise, and I will 
give the recipe in fuller detail: 

Two cups of milk (water may be used). If 
milk is used, scald it and cool to lukewarm. 

A teaspoonful of salt. 

144 



The Home Preparation of Food 

A fourth of a cup of sugar or as much or a 
little more of molasses. ( This sweetening is not 
essential. ) 

A cake of yeast dissolved in one-fourth cup 
of warm water. 

(A little oil, butter or other fat may be used.) 

Whole-wheat flour, about five cupfuls — but on 
this point of exact flour quantities hang many 
tales of failure. Whole-wheat flour absorbs more 
water when cold than white flour; hence the 
danger of soggy bread. Moreover, the flours 
differ; better learn to judge flour quantities by 
the stiffness of the dough and make the dough 
rather drier than white flour dough. 

Add salt and sugar to the milk. When the 
milk is cool, add the dissolved yeast and then 
the flour, stirring thoroughly. The temperature 
of the whole should be between seventy-five and 
eighty. This requires that the flour should be 
warmed in winter, and there are plenty of places 
where it needs to be cooled in summer. Yeast 
grows most rapidly at a temperature of 86 de- 
grees, but it is best that the temperature be under 
rather than over this and the higher temperature 
increases the danger of bacterial growth and sour 
bread. Where the bread in a sponge or dough 
is to be set over night the temperature should 
be between sixty-five and seventy. 

145 



Eating for Health and Strength 

Now for the stirring or kneading. The pur- 
pose is to get an intimate mixture of flour and 
yeast; otherwise some spots will be heavy and 
others get light too quickly and "fall" or sour. 
Stir the dough till it becomes too stiff and then 
take out and knead for a few minutes. Now set 
aside at the proper temperature to raise. If 
things are right it should raise to twice its bulk. 
Then shape into loaves without much kneading 
and put into the pans. Let it raise again one- 
half its bulk — and then to the oven. 

Whole-wheat bread requires a little slower 
oven than white bread. If you have an oven 
thermometer start the bread in a temperature of 
425, let it fall during the baking to about 380 
at the end. The cooking time should be from 
one hour to an hour and fifteen minutes. Natu- 
rally this will depend on the size of the loaf. 
Whole-wheat bread crust is liable to bake harder 
than white. Hard top crusts can usually be 
avoided by shielding the top of the loaf with 
paper or tin covers during the first part of the 
baking process. 

The above process is about as near as one can 
get it from printed recipes. Here is a slight 
modification of it: Instead of adding all the 
flour the first time use only enough to make a 
batter thick enough to drop slowly from a spoon. 

146 



The Home Preparation of Food 

Then let this batter raise to twice its bulk before 
adding the rest of the flour and kneading. Then 
put into pans and proceed as before. It is only 
a difference of when the last part of the flour is 
added and when kneading is done. Try both 
ways and stick to the one which produces better 
bread. 

Whole-wheat bread is about the solidest staff 
of life on which frail man has yet learned to lean. 
Sometimes the staff is too solid. If you, or the 
others who dine at your table find it so you can 
compromise by using part white flour. 

After you once acquire the fine art of judging 
when the yeast has bubbled just enough, then 
there is infinite variety of possible alterations in 
the ingredients. Add ground nuts and it is a 
nut bread; add chopped figs, dates and raisins, 
and it is a fruit bread. 

Those who have not the facilities or time to 
make whole-wheat bread from yeast and who 
cannot buy it in the market will do well to use 
the rather plentiful supply of warm breads made 
either from whole-wheat flour or from corn meal. 
Warm whole-wheat or corn bread, that is — gems, 
muffins and even pancakes, are much more whole- 
some and digestible than similar preparations 
made of white flour. The Graham flour and the 
corn meal are coarser and more granular and do 

147 



Eating for Health and Strength 

not make the sticky, doughy mass that is so objec- 
tionable in warm white-flour breads. . 

The following recipes for making various corn 
breads will serve as a guide to those inexperi- 
enced in such cookery. The making of these 
forms of bread from either corn meal or whole- 
wheat flour is much simpler than making yeast 
bread, and the recipes may be varied, or one 
who has the general principle in mind can make 
a wide variety of such breads off-hand without 
following a definite recipe. 

SOUR MILK CORN BREAD 

Corn-meal, 3 cups 
Sour Milk, 2 cups 
Salt 
Soda 

Stir to a thin batter, and bake in shallow tin. 

CORN PONE OR ASH CAKE 

Corn-meal, 3 cups Salt Water 

Mix corn-meal with salt and scald with boiling water. 
Shape into cakes and bake in quick oven. The classic 
product of log cabin days was baked wrapped in green 
leaves and placed in the ashes, or on boards set before an 
open fire. 

ONE-EGG CORN BREAD 

Corn-meal, 2 cups Cooking fat, 2 tablespoons 

White flour, 1 cup Sugar, 1 tablespoon 

Eggs, one Baking powder, 3 teaspoons 

Milk (skim), 2 cups Salt to taste 

148 



The Home Preparation of Food 

Scald corn-meal with one cup boiling water. Add egg 
well beaten, fat, sugar and milk. Sift flour with baking 
powder, stir to soft batter, and pour into pan in sheet 
three-quarters of an inch thick. 

CORN MUFFINS 

Butter, % cup Baking powder, 5 teaspoons 

Sugar, % cup Milk, 1^ cups 

Eggs, one Flour, 1 cup 
Corn-meal, 2 cups 

Mix cream, butter and sugar; add well-beaten eggs 
gradually, and milk. Then add dry ingredients mixed and 
sifted. Bake in individual tins. 

The root vegetables are for the most part un- 
palatable unless cooked. There are some excep- 
tions to this : raw grated carrots, tender turnips, 
or beets make an excellent ingredient for salads. 

The greatest mistake made in cooking vege- 
tables is that of boiling them in too much water 
and then discarding the water; both the flavor 
and valuable mineral salts are lost in this way. 
All vegetables that are boiled should be cooked 
in as little water as possible — many of them may 
be steamed in a closed pot without being covered 
with water. The juice that remains from the 
boiling of vegetables should not be discarded; 
it should either be used for the making of soups 
or should be boiled down until the quantity of 
juice remaining is not too great to serve with the 
vegetables. Such vegetable juice may be made 

149 



Eating for Health and Strength 

exceedingly palatable by the addition of either 
milk or butter. Almost all vegetables make de- 
lightful soups, either alone or in various com- 
binations; for this purpose the vegetables should 
be cut fine, as the object is to get the flavor into 
the soup and not to retain it in the vegetables 
as when they are served as such. The mere addi- 
tion to finely chopped vegetables cooked in 
water or milk, condensed milk or cream and a 
little butter makes the least expensive and the 
most wholesome form of soup that may be served. 
Do not add flour or other thickening. Potato 
soup, celery soup and onion soup made in this 
fashion are especially fine. 

One of the best methods for cooking practi- 
cally all vegetables is to bake them in a covered 
dish with a little water or milk. This method is 
known as "cooking en casserole." The process 
retains the full flavor and all the soluble mineral 
salts. Either milk or butter, or both are the 
best dressings or sauces for vegetables cooked in 
this fashion. 

Potatoes, sweet potatoes and parsnips may be 
baked. In the baking of these vegetables the 
skin should not be removed. Wash thoroughly 
with a stiff brush, or wash and scrape. This will 
remove the dirt and the skin may be retained. 
Buttering or oiling of potatoes before baking will 

150 



The Home Preparation of Food 

keep the skins from drying out and make them 
more palatable. To pare off the skin of pota- 
toes wastes a large portion of the substances and, 
as in the case of removing the bran from wheat, 
the most valuable ingredients are lost. When 
boiled, the thin outer skin is not so palatable and 
becomes detached in papery layers; in such case 
the best method is to bring the potatoes to a boil, 
which will loosen the outer skin, which may then 
be removed; after this the cooking process may 
be finished in any way desired. But the baking 
process is preferable, as no substance at all is lost ; 
even the outer skin is delicious, and valuable in 
the diet for the reason that it supplies indigesti- 
ble fibre similar to the fibrous element in the 
wheat bran. 

Although there are some exceptions, as in the 
case of old turnips or beets in which the outer 
skin of the vegetable is not palatable, yet as a 
general rule one should retain the outer skin of 
vegetables and not pare it off in thick layers and 
discard it. 

The leafy vegetables should for the most part 
be served as salads uncooked. Cabbage is com- 
monly served both raw and cooked; but the un- 
cooked cabbage used as salads or slaw is the more 
wholesome and digestible. Practically all green 
vegetables may be used in raw salads, when one 

151 



Eating for Health and Strength 

becomes accustomed to the flavor of them. For 
use in this form they will naturally be more ap- 
petizing if young and tender. 

The purpose of leafy vegetables in the diet is 
to supply vitamines, minerals and cellulose or 
fibre. The cooking process may destroy or re- 
duce the available quantity of vitamines and if 
all juice is not retained will waste the mineral 
salts. Hence the importance of using leafy 
vegetables in uncooked form. Some of the 
tougher and older varieties of leafy vegetables 
may be cooked as greens. Greens are most ap- 
petizing when served with a dressing of oil and 
lemon juice; those who prefer meat flavors in the 
diet may cook greens with a little bacon, ham 
or chipped beef. The chipped dried beef in 
small quantities is also an excellent ingredient 
to add flavor to uncooked salads. 

The salads may be made in almost an endless 
number of forms, but the leafy vegetables, 
usually lettuce, celery or raw cabbage, should 
always be the chief ingredients. The salad dress- 
ing should have a vegetable oil as the main in- 
gredient. Some sort of acid is necessary to give 
piquancy and flavor; vinegar is commonly used 
for the purpose, though I recommend lemon 
juice, as being the more wholesome and natural 
form of food acid. Mayonnaise dressing is made 

152 



The Home Preparation of Food 

of oil, vinegar or lemon juice and egg yolk. In 
order to make a good Mayonnaise dressing one 
should first beat the egg yolks until they are per- 
fectly smooth, then drop in the necessary quan- 
tity of oil drop by drop, stirring the mass the 
whole time; when all the oil has been incorpor j 
ated, add vinegar or lemon juice and salt to taste. 
Some prefer also to add some small portion of 
mustard. In order to get a perfect emulsion 
all the ingredients should be as cold as possible. 

Salad dressings may also be made with the 
use of evaporated milk or cream to replace all 
or part of the egg yolks and oil. Peanut but- 
ter thinned with a little milk or water may be 
used in a similar fashion. Sugar may be used 
or omitted from salad dressing according to 
taste. Dressings for salads for use in the reduc- 
ing in cases of obesity should omit the oil ; and in 
this case a little mustard or ketchup to give flavor 
to the dressing is quite excusable. 

Legumes, which include beans, peas, lentils 
and peanuts, all require cooking to make them 
palatable. Peanuts are occasionally eaten raw, 
but most people do not care for the flavor. This 
group of foods is more benefited by cooking than 
foods of almost any other sort; not only is this 
true because of the improvement of flavor, but 
raw legumes are not readily digestible. The in- 

153 



Eating for Health and Strength 

creased proportion of vegetable protein mixed 
with the starch seems to be one of the most diffi- 
cult to digest of all food substances; hence thor- 
ough cooking, which softens and disintegrates the 
substance, is really necessary. Peanut butter is 
made from roasted nuts — only they are not nuts 
at all, but belong to the legume family. The 
roasting and grinding renders the peanut much 
more digestible. 

Nuts, like legumes, are somewhat difficult of 
digestion because of the insoluble nature of their 
vegetable proteins, but in the case of nuts the 
additional ingredient is fat rather than starch 
and, therefore, they are not benefited by cooking. 
The important thing in using nuts is their 
thorough mastication. When nuts are desired to 
flavor other foods, they may be ground finely in 
a chopper. Such chopped nut meat is an excel- 
lent ingredient of salads and may also be used 
with cereals; or they may be added to give the 
nutty or meaty flavor to baked vegetable com- 
binations, which are frequently used in vegetari- 
an cookery to replace the meat dish of the meal. 

Fruits are rarely benefited by cooking and, as 
in the case of leafy vegetables, I advise the use 
of fruit uncooked wherever possible. The ex- 
ception might be taken in the case of green fruit, 
but the better plan is to use thoroughly ripened 

154 



The Home Preparation of Food 

fruits only, rather than to attempt to substitute 
cooking for the natural ripening process. 

Evaporated fruits such as prunes, peaches and 
apricots are usually cooked, but a more natural 
flavor may be obtained by soaking such dried 
fruits over-night. If one likes a little cooked 
flavor they may be brought to a boil the next 
morning, but the prolonged cooking of evapo- 
rated fruits is wholly unnecessary. 

The banana more nearly resembles the starchy 
vegetables than it does the true fruits. In order 
to get it to our markets the banana is picked 
green; it should not be used until thoroughly 
ripened. The thoroughly ripened banana has a 
speckled black and yellow skin; because of the 
bruising of the fruit, bananas often spoil before 
this stage of ripening is reached. Because of 
the starchy nature of the unripened banana its 
flavor may be improved by cooking. The best 
method of doing this is to bake the banana in its 
skin. Bananas may either be used in this form 
or used raw, if well ripened. It is an inexpen- 
sive and wholesome food, deserving wide use. 

The habit of preparing fruit with too much 
sugar is a dietary error; the making of thick, 
syrupy fruits and of jellies, jams and marma- 
lades is excusable if the appetite calls for sweets, 
for such dishes are certainly preferable to the 

155 



Eating for Health and Strength 

wholly denatured cane and glucose syrups. But 
the better method is to use the fruits uncooked, 
and if well ripened most fruits may be so used 
with little or no sugar. The better forms of 
sweets are the natural sweet fruits, such as raisins, 
dates and figs. To this list of natural sweets we 
may add honey. These splendid foods deserve 
more extensive use. They may be eaten alone or 
with nuts, or used to sweeten cereal dishes. 

Fruit juices, or drinks made therefrom, are 
most palatable and wholesome. Fruit juice 
drinks together with milk are the true health 
drinks or beverages. Alcoholic drinks have been 
abolished by law, and the health of the nation 
would be improved if the narcotic tea and coffee 
were also abolished. Cocoa contains a small per- 
centage of an alkaloid narcotic, but the nutritious 
ingredients of the cocoa, and particularly the milk 
with which it is combined, so overbalance this 
narcotic effect that we may place the cocoa on 
the permissible list for those who insist upon 
some form of warm drink. Cereal coffees are 
not particularly nutritious except for the milk 
and sugar they contain; but they are, of course, 
harmless. Their great utility has been as a sub- 
stitute for the harmful coffee. 

The methods of cooking, which I do not advise, 
either from the standpoint of health or economy, 

156 



The Home Preparation of Food 



are those in which starches and fats and often 
sugar are mixed together. This includes all 
manner of pastries, as well as many of the com- 
plicated hashes, gravies and dumplings, etc. 
Such methods of cookery add unreasonably to the 
housewife's labor and the products, while tasty, 
are neither digestible nor wholesome, and usually 
lead to over-eating. Such dishes as mince pies 
and plum pudding are notorious offenders. But 
the general list of foods made from white flour, 
fats and sugars with or without meat combina- 
tions are all worthless, except for their fuel or 
caloric value, and our conventional diet is already 
overburdened with food material of this sort. 

Frying is the least wholesome method of 
cookery, especially when applied to foods contain- 
ing starch. Purely protein foods such as eggs, 
fish and lean meats, may be fried without much 
injury to their nutritive or digestible qualities. 
If one must fry potatoes the best method is the 
French fried, in which the potatoes in compara- 
tively large pieces are dropped into hot grease, 
so that at least the entire substance does not be- 
come saturated. 

The amount of time, worry and labor expended 
on preparing foods in the average American 
household is an utterly inexcusable waste of 
human energy. Whenever possible foods should 

157 



Eating for Health and Strength 



be used in their natural forms, or the dishes made 
therefrom should be simple. Complicated and 
elaborate cookery serves no purpose whatever, 
except to waste a woman's time and lead her 
family to over-eating and gluttony. 

As ordinarily practiced this system of elaborate 
cooking runs in a vicious circle. The foods are 
too highly flavored, and too readily swallowed 
without mastication. This results in over-eat- 
ing. Over-eating results in loss of appetite, and 
with a poor appetite, and the belief that one must 
forever eat to keep up one's strength, comes the 
demand for more complicated dishes and more 
highly seasoned food. 

The cure for this vicious system is to go back 
to a natural diet of simple foods, and to wait for 
the return of natural appetite, before eating. 
This will often result in the eating of less food, 
with the resultant loss in weight ; but such loss of 
weight is usually beneficial. Unless a man has 
been educated away from the erroneous view that 
an enormous appetite, the consumption of huge 
quantities of food, and the resultant over-weight 
are all desirable, he will, of course, be frightened, 
imagine that he is starving to death, and return 
to his flesh-pots, and continue his health-destroy- 
ing habits. 



158 



CHAPTER XI 

Practical Food Economy 

'THE general plan of diet advocated through- 
out this book is neither the cheapest nor the 
most expensive. But it is cheaper than the con- 
ventional diet usually eaten in the American 
home, because it eliminates the almost universal 
habit of over-eating, and because it eliminates 
the bulk of the expenditure for meat, which is 
usually the most expensive item in the American 
bill-of-fare. 

I do not, however, advocate extreme measures 
in food economy; outside of the emergencies of 
war and famine, the attempt to cut the cost of 
food down to the very minimum is both unneces- 
sary and unwise. The cheapest foods used by 
man are the grains, and the cheapest grain in this 
country is corn, but a diet in which grain products 
and especially commercial corn-meal and white 
flour predominate is decidedly deficient and will 
not maintain life and health. Some of the poorer 
families in the South live largely on commercial 
corn-meal, white flour, fat pork and molasses. 
The result is a weak and badly nourished race on 
which the terrible pellagra inflicts such havoc. 

159 



Eating for Health and Strength 

If the cereal foods be used in the form of entire 
grains, particularly in the case of wheat, their 
dietetic deficiencies are partly (not wholly) over- 
come. Even in the most wholesome and appe- 
tizing form cereals neither supply all elements 
of nutrition, nor are they sufficiently palatable 
to recommend their use to the exclusion of other 
food. 

The least expensive and most effective way to 
overcome the deficiencies of cereal foods is by the 
addition of milk and leafy vegetables. 

This combination, therefore, makes the cheap- 
est safe diet known. In country districts where 
whole-wheat, milk and green vegetables may all 
be had at comparatively low prices, a man can 
live on such a diet and be adequately nourished 
at the cost of a few cents a day. All diets at- 
tempting to cut the cost of food to a minimum 
should include these three ingredients. The 
Whole Wheat, of course, may be used in both 
the cereal and the bread form ; corn products may 
be substituted for the wheat in part or in whole, 
if the diet is sufficiently fortified with the milk 
and greens. 

In addition to the above three groups of food 
the appetite will crave some form of fat, and also 
sweet. The most economical way to secure these 
would be in the form of vegetable oil and sugar ; 

160 



Practical Food Economy 



here again we may say that if plenty of whole 
milk and leafy vegetables are used the deficien- 
cies of such oil and sugar may be overcome. 
The safer plan, however, and certainly a more 
desirable one from the standpoint of palatability 
and variety would be to use a portion of natural 
sweet fruits, and some genuine dairy butter. 

For the purposes of illustrating how these 
principles of food economy work out, I will give 
below three menus, figuring these three degrees 
of simplicity and showing the comparative cost 
of each. Of course, all prices of foods are sub- 
ject to change without notice, and the reader in- 
terested in the subject will have to re-figure the 
cost according to the price list he would have to 
pay. 

THE LOWEST COST MENUS 

Three-quarters of a pound of Whole Wheat $ .02 

Half a pound of Corn-meal or Hominy 02 

One quart of Whole Milk 10 

Half a pound of Leafy Vegetables 05 

(Lettuce, Raw Cabbage or Greens) 

Cost per man per day, $ .19 

Three-quarters of a pound of Wheat :•. . .$ .02 

One-quarter pound of Corn-meal or Hominy 01 

One quart of Milk 10 

Two ounces of Sugar 01 

One ounce of Vegetable Oil 02 

Half a pound of Leafy Vegetables 05 

Cost per man per day, $ .19 
161 



Eating for Health and Strength 

Of course, the preceding menus are doubtless 
too monotonous and unpalatable to the average 
individual for practical, or at least permanent 
use. The following menu, with ingenuity of 
cooking and serving of ingredients, would about 
be at the bed-rock of practical economy for uni- 
versal use. 

Six ounces of Whole Wheat $ .02 

Two ounces of Corn-meal or Hominy 01 

Two ounces of Oatmeal 01 

One quart of Whole Milk 10 

One ounce of Sugar 005 

One ounce of Butter 03 

One ounce of Vegetable Oil 02 

Two ounces of Dates or Raisins 02 

Four ounces of Potatoes or other Roots 01 

Quarter pound of Leafy Vegetables 025 

Cost per man per day, $ .25 

The above menus are given to illustrate the 
basic principle by which food economy must be 
achieved rather than as practical menus of real 
use. The food quantities given in each case ap- 
proximate 2,500 calories and hence furnish 
enough fuel food for the average man. But 
there will be very few readers of this book who 
will see fit to attempt such extreme economies in 
the diet. 

The addition of greater variety to the diet will 
naturally enhance the cost. A moderate amount 

162 



Practical Food Economy 



of such variety and such increased cost is usually 
worth while to all who can afford it. Palata- 
bility, the pleasure of eating, is worth paying 
for to a moderate degree. It is only when this 
catering to the appetite results in excessive ex- 
pense, and particularly when the extra expense 
adds no true improvement to the diet, that it is 
to be condemned. 

All readers who read the previous chapters of 
this book will be fully impressed with the fact 
that the quantity of fuel value, which the scien- 
tists measure in calories, does not tell all we need 
to know about food. Yet since the fuel value is 
one element that must be considered, and because 
it is the only element that can be easily reduced 
to a numerical figure, this quantity of fuel or 
caloric value is usually taken as the basis in figur- 
ing food economy. 

Such figures are interesting and instructive, 
and are of some practical value to those who 
comprehend that the fuel value of food is only 
one element of food quality and that other fac- 
tors must also be considered. I do not expect 
any reader to compute the number of calories in 
his daily diet — such a mathematical calculation 
is too troublesome — but there are practical daily 
questions that every one interested in daily food 
economy must answer. For illustration: Are 

163 



Eating for Health and Strength 

eggs at fifty cents a dozen more economical than 
milk at sixteen cents a quart? Are potatoes at 
four cents a pound cheaper than bread at ten 
cents a pound? Are raisins at fifteen cents a 
pound more expensive than grapes at five cents 
a pound? 

In order to enable the reader to answer such 
questions I have devised a table which will show 
the comparative worth of various foods at various 
prices. At the left hand side of this table you 
will find the more important foods listed. These 
foods are grouped according to their caloric 
value, which, of course, has nothing to do with the 
natural food groups that we have elsewhere dis- 
cussed as the basis of planning a complete or bal- 
anced menu. Across the top of this table you 
will find, given in bold type, figures which in- 
dicate various prices of these foods per pound. 
In the case of eggs, only, these prices apply per 
dozen. In the case of milk, the price should be 
considered per pint, which, of course, is approxi- 
mately a pound. 

The figures in the body of this table represent 
the cost of 2,500 calories, providing the price per 
pound be that given at the head of the column. I 
chose the unit of 2,500 calories as that approxi- 
mates the fuel value required by the average man 
for one day. This enables you to think of these 

164 



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13 ^2 > ^ 



Practical Food Economy 



figures as meaning what it would cost a man to 
live per day if he ate only the food under con- 
sideration. Certainly I am not advising any one 
to live on a single food even for a single day, but 
the idea of the cost of food per day is a term 
that has some practical significance, while the 
phrase 2,500 calories sounds purely scientific and 
theoretical. 

Now to apply our table. Suppose we wish to 
answer the question suggested above; eggs are 
fifty cents a dozen, milk is sixteen cents a quart ; 
we want to know whether we can afford to sub- 
stitute eggs for a portion of our milk. We look 
at the word "eggs" and trace the horizontal until 
we come to a column headed "50"; here we find 
the figure "1.25," which is the cost of 2,500 cal- 
ories of eggs at fifty cents, or what it would cost 
a man to live a day on an exclusive egg diet. 
We now find "fresh whole milk;" sixteen cents a 
quart will be eight cents a pint or pound; we 
therefore look in the column headed "8" and find 
the cost of 2,500 calories of milk will be sixty 
cents, which would be the daily cost of living for 
a man on milk diet. 

Now take the example of bread versus pota- 
toes; by consulting our table we will find that 
for bread at ten cents a pound loaf, the cost will 
be 21 cents a day, whereas potatoes at four cents 

165 



Eating for Health and Strength 

a pound will cost 24 cents a day. Potatoes at 
four cents a pound are not, therefore, an econ- 
omy, compared with bread at ten cents ; but sup- 
pose potatoes came down to two cents a pound 
and bread to eight cents; we now find the com- 
parative cost to be 17 cents for bread and 12 
cents for potatoes. 

This table of comparative food values will, I 
believe, be very helpful in showing you the com- 
parative worth of different foods at different 
prices. You will probably find, by running 
through the table with a number of foods you 
use, that you have entertained some false ideas 
as to what foods are most economical. The fig- 
ures of the table are only approximate, being 
computed to the nearest whole number, but it is 
amply accurate for all practical purposes. 

I can not caution you too strongly against con- 
sidering this matter of food economy as the entire 
or even the principal fact about foods that needs 
your attention. Much harm has been wrought 
by the over-emphasizing of the caloric value of 
foods. For illustration: To substitute cereals 
for milk in the feeding of children because cere- 
als furnish calories at a cheap rate, is a crime 
too obvious to need explanation. Again the 
white flour millers have repeatedly defended their 
product because of its high caloric value and ap- 

166 



Pkactical Food Economy 



parent economy. It is just as sensible to tell a 
man to run his automobile on kerosene because 
he can buy more calories per gallon in kerosene 
than he can in gasoline. But even this illustra- 
tion is not forcible enough, for engineers may 
yet devise an automobile engine that will run bet- 
ter on kerosene than it will on gasoline, but the 
chemist of the white flour millers will never be 
able to devise a man who will run better on de- 
natured white bread than he will on the whole 
wheat product. 

Among the most common errors in food econ- 
omy made by the American housewife are the 
over-use of meats, the over-use of canned goods, 
and the attempt to use fresh fruits and vegetables 
out of their natural seasons. 

Fat meats are cheap when considered on a basis 
of calories, and they are utterly worthless on 
any other basis — but cheap as they are, fat meats 
and animal fats are never as cheap as the more 
wholesome vegetable oils. The various oils and 
cooking fats made from either cotton-seed oil or 
cocoanuts are the most economical of all fats. 
The use of such fats is to be recommended for 
economy, provided they do not crowd out all true 
milk or butter fat from the diet. 

Lean meats are never a cheap source of food 
from any standpoint whatever. Lean beef, even 

167 



Eating for Health and Strength 

at thirty cents a pound, considered for its fuel 
value, is fifty per cent more expensive than milk 
at sixteen cents a quart ; but fuel value is the least 
important thing to consider in the comparison of 
meat with milk; and from every other standpoint 
the meat is inferior for most people. 

The use of canned goods is extravagant merely 
because of the expense of this method of preser- 
vation. The cans often cost more than the food 
that is put into them. The canned goods habit 
is one that the housewife falls into because it saves 
her time and labor, but the canned food diet is 
inferior to one of fresh fruits and vegetables, or 
in many cases to dried fruits and vegetables. I 
certainly hope to see an increased development of 
scientific drying or desiccating as a means of pre- 
serving food to replace the present over-develop- 
ment of our canned industry. The extravagance 
of canned goods is seen at its worst in the case 
of pickles, preserves and tit-bits of various sorts, 
which are put up in fancy small tins or bottles and 
sold at perfectly ridiculous prices. 

While I dislike to say anything that will dis- 
courage the use of fresh fruits and vegetables, 
yet it certainly is not economical to attempt to 
use these products when nature does not produce 
them except under hot-house cultivation. There 
are too many wholesome foods of these groups 

168 



Practical Food Economy 



that can be had, either fresh or cheaply preserved, 
at any season of the year, to excuse the use of 
December strawberries or similar extravagances, 
merely to out-do one's neighbor, or because they 
have been given in some menu one is trying to 
follow. This argument also applies with consid- 
erable force to the use of eggs ; this excellent food 
is usually reasonable in cost in the spring and 
summer, but unreasonable in cost, except for the 
inferior storage grade, in fall and winter. 



169 



CHAPTER XII 

Eating for Strength and Muscular 
Efficiency 

HHHE earliest food chemists believed that pro- 
tein foods, and especially lean meats were 
the best foods for giving one strength and 
energy; such a conclusion was only natural with 
their limited knowledge. Muscles were com- 
posed of protein, hence it seemed to follow that 
to gain muscular strength, one should eat simi- 
lar substance, i.e., the muscles of animals. 

The error in this reasoning was in assuming 
that the muscle in being exercised, or creating 
energy, consumes itself and, therefore, would 
need food substance of similar nature to replace 
the waste. This view we now know to be wrong, 
and that the muscle acts merely as an engine in 
which is oxidized or burned food fuel in the form 
of blood sugar. This blood sugar may be de- 
rived from protein, but that is not the best source 
from which to get it. 

The protein theory of muscular strength was 
first shown to be an error by two European 
scientists who climbed Mont Blanc on a diet con- 

170 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

taining no protein. They showed that the loss 
of body weight during this arduous task was not 
sufficient to explain the origin of the energy ac- 
quired from the destruction of their own muscu- 
lar tissue. As they ate no protein food they con- 
cluded that the source of muscular energy must 
come from the fat and carbohydrate foods which 
they consumed. 

This belief that protein foods were the source 
of muscular energy died very hard in the scien- 
tific world. It is by no means dead yet in the 
mind of the man in the street, who believes that 
he must eat meat to keep up his strength. There 
is perhaps just a slight bit of truth in this still 
popular belief in the strength-giving qualities of 
meat. That effect is probably due to a slight 
immediate stimulating effect. 

In my own experience as a wrestler, many 
years ago, I tried out various kinds of diet and 
observed their effects upon myself very carefully. 
I found that meat would increase my actual 
strength, but would lessen my endurance. I 
could lift a heavier weight under the influence of 
the diet in which meat was liberally supplied, but 
I could not lift a lighter weight so many times. 
I also discovered through those early experiments 
that eggs did not have this unfavorable effect on 
my endurance, though they seemed nearly, if not 

171 



Eating for Health and Strength 

quite equal to meat as a means of supplying im- 
mediate strength. Both strength and endurance 
were essential to my work as a wrestler, and in 
my efforts to attain my greatest possible strength 
without loss of endurance, I adopted, after many 
long experiments, a diet containing a limited 
quantity of meat. I ate eggs frequently, but did 
not use meats oftener than once in two to four 
days ; the bulk of my diet consisted of eggs, whole 
wheat bread, vegetables and fruit. Upon this 
diet I maintained such a fitness that no competi- 
tor ever gained a single fall from me in my favor- 
ite style of wrestling, though many of my op- 
ponents weighed from fifteen to fifty pounds 
more than I. 

The evidence that a heavy meat diet is bene- 
ficial in increasing immediate strength is not as 
overwhelming or convincing as the evidence 
against meat in matters of endurance. For il- 
lustration: in a long distance race of 125 miles, 
which was run some years ago between Dresden 
and Berlin, there were thirty-two entries, twelve 
of whom were meat eaters and twenty vegetari- 
ans; the race was won by a vegetarian who was 
eight hours in advance of his best meat-eating 
competitor. Only three of the meat-eaters out 
of twelve finished the race within the prescribed 
time of forty-five hours, but ten of the vegeta- 

172 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

rians finished. The winner of the race had been 
a vegetarian for nine years and ate but two meals 
a day; his diet consisted chiefly of whole wheat 
bread and uncooked fruits and nuts ; he had dis- 
carded legumes (beans, peas, etc.) from the diet, 
maintaining that they required too much vital 
force for digestion — a conclusion well borne out 
by present scientific knowledge. 

More recent scientific investigation has thrown 
much light upon this question of the diets best 
adapted for the production of the greatest 
strength and efficiency. This investigation of 
Horace Fletcher and his associates, to which ref- 
erence has been made, indicated very clearly that 
a low protein diet resulted in superior physical 
efficiency. Mr. Fletcher himself broke several 
records at the Yale Gymnasium that had been 
made by the best of the college athletes. This 
achievement astonished the world because Mr. 
Fletcher, at the time was over fifty years of age 
and had not trained particularly for these tests, 
as had his youthful and over-nourished competi- 
tors. Fletcher's diet contained very little meat, 
the small quantity of protein being derived from 
milk and eggs. The systematic and carefully 
supervised experiments which were conducted at 
Yale following these demonstrations all gave 
convincing evidence that a minimum diet with 

173 



Eating for Health and Strength 

very little protein, and "Fletcherized," that is, 
eaten slowly and exceedingly well masticated, 
would materially increase the endurance and 
efficiency. 

When these experiments were made Mr. 
Fletcher gave the chief credit to mastication, 
while the scientists of Yale gave the chief credit 
to the low protein — both of these factors un- 
doubtedly contributed toward the results. But 
in the light of very recent experiments we should 
also give credit to the reduction of the total quan- 
tity of food. 

The limit of a man's physical endurance 
(which means his practical strength in all muscu- 
lar operations, enduring for more than a few 
seconds ) is due to the following causes : the limit 
of the breathing capacity ; the limit of the capac- 
ity of the heart to carry fresh blood to the 
muscles; the accumulation of fatigue poisons. 

As to the matter of breathing, there is no way 
to improve one's power in this respect, except by 
developing chest expansion and lung capacity. 
In the matter of circulation, as influenced by the 
rate of the heart-beat, some interesting facts were 
discovered during this test at the Y. M. C. A. 
College on the restricted diet. The pulse rate of 
the men on the restricted diet decreased; this 
would indicate that a less rapid flow of blood was 

174 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

necessary to furnish the required fuel and remove 
fatigue poisons from the muscles. Now, when 
these men were put through a tread-mill test, it 
was found that though their pulse rate was in- 
creased by the exercise it did not go nearly so high 
as the pulse rate of full-fed men; it would seem 
from this that the men on this minimum diet 
would have latent powers of endurance, because 
of this capacity to keep up a given amount of 
energy production with a lower pulse rate. The 
seeming truth of this reasoning is borne out by 
the practical observations of the increased en- 
durance upon an abstemious diet. 

Fatigue is caused by the accumulation in the 
muscle cells of the waste products of their activi- 
ties. These are constantly being removed by the 
blood stream, but the continued activity results 
in a certain accumulation in excess of the capac- 
ity of the blood to remove the waste. Some of 
these waste products are similar to those found 
in meat and the proportion of such products in 
meat would depend somewhat upon the degree 
of fatigue of the animal at the time of its death. 
It is thus argued against a meat diet that it adds 
to the fatigue poisons of our own activities, and 
others derived from the animals of which we eat. 

The use of excessive protein, either of animal 
or vegetable origin seems to have a somewhat 

175 



Eating for Health and Strength 

similar effect, for the protein which is not used 
by the body must be broken down into similar 
waste products before it can be eliminated from 
the body. The general sense of physical fitness 
derived from the use of a light diet and prefer- 
ably a light protein and meat-free diet is prob- 
ably to be explained by this greater freedom from 
fatigue poisons. 

The weight of the body and the amount of fat 
has an obvious effect upon muscular strength and 
efficiency. Any one knows that a fat man is 
weak and clumsy and that an athlete should train 
down to hard muscle before he can hope to win 
against his competitors. 

In the past, however, athletes have often at- 
tempted to take off their fat by exercise, while 
still living upon a diet, the tendency of which was 
to put fat back on them. The exercise is cer- 
tainly essential, but the task of training is made 
much more difficult where exercise and diet are 
thus at war with each other. 

Probably the most efficient condition of the 
body is one in which the fat is reduced almost 
to the vanishing point. Just where this point is, 
is not easy to determine, for the reason that there 
is much fat deposited throughout the body, the 
presence of which does not show upon the sur- 
face of the body. In the experiments on re- 

176 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

stricted diets quoted in our chapter on "How 
Much to Eat," the young men, though athletic 
to start with, all lost ten per cent of their weight, 
and yet were able to keep up their strength. 
In fact, the comparison of the strength of these 
before and after losing this ten per cent of weight, 
was so close that, for the group as a whole, the 
averages showed that they had gained a little 
strength in one hand and lost it in the other. In 
the chinning tests several of the men on the re- 
stricted diet broke their previous records made 
on a full diet; eight out of twelve of these men 
held their arms extended for one hour. 

I do not believe that these men could have 
shown such muscular efficiency if their loss in 
weight had been chiefly in muscular tissue, for 
such a loss from a 150-pound man v/ould mean 
fifteen pounds, about one-fifth of his total mus- 
cular substance. The weights and photographs 
of these men showed them to be, at the begin- 
ning of the experiment, in about the condition 
of the average athletic individual who is eating 
rather heavily and training moderately. Such 
men evidently carry some surplus fat which they 
can afford to lose without any loss of strength. 

The actual fuel burned in the muscle is physi- 
ological glucose or blood-sugar; it, therefore, 
follows that such sugar is the most easily avail- 

177 






Eating fok Health and Strength 

able for the production of muscular energy. 
When the free supply of this blood sugar is 
consumed, the fat, either direct from the food 
or from the body, is next drawn upon, being 
converted into sugar before it can be utilized in 
the muscles. After all fat is exhausted, as in 
the case of a starving man, then and only then 
do the muscles consume themselves or burn 
protein. When this point is reached, strength 
deteriorates rapidly and weakness and ulti- 
mately death occur. As long as there is a 
supply of sugar in the blood, or stored in a 
slightly altered form of glycogen in the liver, 
body fat will not be drawn upon; on the other 
hand as long as there is fat in the body the 
muscles or other active tissues will not be con- 
sumed. 

From these statements we can draw the fol- 
lowing conclusions: First, the best form of 
nutritive energy is that of blood-sugar; and as 
long as the supply of this is not exhausted 
nothing else will be consumed. (The loss of 
weight that occurs in ordinary athletic contests 
is chiefly due to the loss of weight of water.) 
Second: so long as man has any appreciable 
amount of fat in his body neither exercise nor the 
reduction of the diet can cause the destruction 
of his vital tissues or cells by muscular work. 

178 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

As a practical application of these principles, 
in recommending a diet for muscular strength 
and endurance, we must place first in the list 
the foods that will produce blood-sugar. These 
foods . in order of their ease of digestion and 
quickness of assimilation are as follows: — First: 
The natural food sugars, such as dates, raisins, 
grapes and honey. Second: Artificial sugars, 
granulated sugar and syrups. Third: Starches. 
Fourth: Fats. Fifth: Protein. This rating of 
foods in order of their readiness for blood sugar 
production does not, of course, mean that the 
athlete should disturb the fundamental basis of 
a complete diet. The salts, vitamines and high 
efficiency proteins are required for the athlete 
as for any one else, but for the additional food 
that his extra exertions require, or for the imme- 
diate food to be used just prior to or while 
undergoing such exertion, the list as given shows 
the order of preference. The use of chocolate 
for soldiers on the march is well founded, as the 
sweetened chocolate so used is chiefly sugar with 
a smaller proportion of fat. Except for the 
matter of flavor plain sugar would do as well. 
But I believe the very best foods that can be 
found for this especial purpose are dried sweet 
fruits. 

Part of the argument in favor of the use of 
179 



Eating for Health and Strength 

such special foods during, or immediately pre- 
ceding strenuous exertion rests on the fact that 
these foods require the least consumption of 
energy for their digestion and are least likely 
to make trouble with indigestion when the blood 
is drawn away from the alimentary tract, be- 
cause of the vigorous use of the muscles. Do 
not overlook the fact that the digestion of food 
consumes considerable energy — particularly is 
this true of protein food. This energy spent on 
digestion adds nothing to the energy available 
for muscular exertion, but only puts an addi- 
tional burden on the heart and lungs. In exert- 
ing the muscles for a few seconds the limit of 
strength is one of actual muscular power, but in 
endurance the limit is the ability of the heart 
to circulate the blood and the lungs to purify 
it. Here perhaps we see the reason why the 
meat diet does not effect strength but does effect 
endurance. 

Where food must be taken during severe 
physical labor the foods requiring the least en- 
ergy in digestion are obviously indicated. But 
it does not follow that one should be eating all 
the time during strenuous labor. Such use of 
sugar foods is necessary only during long 
marches, long cycling, swimming and walking 
contests, where the activity must be kept up 

180 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

constantly for hours or perhaps days. For ordi- 
nary athletic events it is much better to enter 
the contest with an empty stomach; the last 
meal should be taken several hours before such 
competition, and nothing can be superior for 
such a meal than sweet fruits with perhaps a 
glass or two of milk. 

The eating of ordinary meals containing 
starches, fats and protein difficult to digest dur- 
ing periods of specially strenuous labor is a 
imiatake — complete fasting would be better. 
This fact is well illustrated by the experience of 
as engineer who was working a twelve-hour shift 
alternating with a man who had the habit of not 
showing up, the result being that the reliable 
man sometimes had to work thirty-six hours at 
a stretch. The company very kindly provided 
a full meal, sent from a restaurant, every six 
hours. The result of a couple of such expe- 
riences was a serious case of illness. The next 
time it happened the engineer refused the food 
and went through the thirty-six hour shift on a 
fast; he then went home and had his sleep out, 
and came through the experience as fit as a 
fiddle. 

Just as it is inadvisable to eat heavily imme- 
diately before or during an athletic contest, so 
one should not eat heavily immediately after. 

181 



Eating for Health and Strength 

It is highly important for the man who in- 
dulges in heavy exercise or labor for limited 
periods and has long periods of rest or light 
labor in between, to adapt his diet to the 
changed condition. Otherwise the habits of eat- 
ing necessarily adopted during the periods of 
strenuous labor will be continued, the result is 
that he will be over-fed, even if he does not 
actually get fat. Such over-feeding will result 
in a stuffed and inefficient condition. He is 
particularly likely not to notice this, as the 
shrinkage of the muscles due to the discontinu- 
ance of exercise will permit of a considerable 
accumulation of fat before it becomes noticeable. 

A great deal of time and physical efficiency 
is lost by boxers and other seasonal athletes 
in getting into and out of training. If their 
diet was more carefully adapted to their actual 
needs from time to time, getting back into shape 
would be much easier accomplished. But the 
worst mistake of this sort is that made by the 
average business man who spends his youth as 
a boy on a farm, or athlete in a college and ac- 
quires a hearty appetite, and then tries to keep 
up his eating capacity after he settles down into 
a swivel chair and indulges in nothing more 
strenuous than getting into and out of an 
automobile. 

382 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

To attempt to prescribe the exact amount of 
food that should be eaten by the man doing heavy 
physical labor, and particularly by the athlete, 
is even more difficult and impracticable than to 
prescribe the amount of food for those of seden- 
tary occupation. This difficulty will be readily 
seen by a glance at the following figures, which 
show the consumption of food energy under dif- 
ferent conditions of physical activity. 

Calories 
per hour 

Sleeping 65 

Sitting 100 

Walking slowly 170 

Walking rapidly 300 

Running, six miles per hour 500 

From such figures it is seen how very great are 
the differences of energy consumption with dif- 
ferent forms of exercise. Hence to calculate 
how many calories per day an athlete would need, 
we would have to know the exact number of min- 
utes engaged in sleeping, standing, sitting, walk- 
ing and running, and so forth. Even this exact 
degree of exertion in all these conditions could 
not be known, to say nothing of the factors of 
the size of the man and his individual physical 
efficiency in converting food into energy — hence 
the absurdity of all such efforts to prescribe the 
exact amount of food that any man should eat. 

183 



Eating for Health and Strength 



We can also note from the above figures that 
the rate of consumption in such exercise as run- 
ning would amount to 5,000 calories for a ten- 
hour day; a man who ran twenty-four hours — 
and it has been done — would consume 12,000 
calories. All such figures are away above the 
capacity of a man to digest and assimilate food, 
hence these especially strenuous endurance tests 
are only possible from the temporary consump- 
tion of food stored in the body with the result 
that such special exertion causes a temporary loss 
in weight. 

As a practical problem the athlete should 
gauge the amount of food eaten, not by calcula- 
tion of calories, but by the weight of the body 
and the sense of physical fitness. The more mus- 
cular energy expended the greater will be the 
amount of food needed; but it does not follow 
that excessive eating will increase the muscular 
powers; quite the contrary is true. The ideal, 
in any case, is to eat just enough to sustain the 
general average expenditure of food energy. The 
muscles work more efficiently and endurance is 
greater when the body is not clogged with an ex- 
cess of nutritive elements, and the vitality wasted 
first in digesting and then eliminating the use- 
less surplus. Therefore, it is much better to keep 
the average food consumption down near the 

184 



Eating for Strength and Efficiency 

minimum, even if it results in loss of body weight 
during the times of severe exertion, than it is to 
attempt at all times to eat enough for those 
periods of special energy expenditure, with the 
result of over-eating at other times and a gen- 
eral lowering of efficiency. 



185 



CHAPTER XIII 

Food and Mental Efficiency 

OAVAGES are reputed to have eaten the 
hearts of their enemies in order to acquire 
their courage. Civilized men, even scientists 
until very recently, believed that we should eat 
the muscles of the ox in order to acquire the 
strength of the ox. But I am not aware that 
anybody has ever advocated or practised eating 
of brains in order to benefit mentally. 

Another superstition that seems even less 
plausible did arise, and is still believed in by some 
people; it is that fish is a brain food. This un- 
warranted belief was founded upon the somewhat 
accidental discovery that both the human brains 
and the meat of fish contain phosphorus. As a 
matter of fact many other foods are now known 
to be richer in phosphorus than fish, whereas 
phosphorus is a very minor element in the com- 
position of brain substance. None the less the 
incomplete knowledge of the early chemists gave 
rise to the belief in fish as brain food, and also to 
a slogan of the early German materialists who 
said "Keine Phosphor, heine Gedenken" — "No 
phosphorus, no thought." 

186 



Food and Mental Efficiency 

The Physiology of the brain and he function 
of thinking are much more complex . atters and 
less comprehended by science than are the 
physiology of the muscles and the function of 
muscular exercise. 

The brain is composed chiefly of protein, but 
there is also a little highly specialized fatty sub- 
stance known as lecithin, which is also present 
in egg yolks. As the action of the muscles 
does not consume its substance, so the action of 
the brain does not consume its substance, but, 
whereas muscular action consumes a very sub- 
stantial quantity of food fuel, brain action does 
not consume any substance in quantities that 
science has been able to measure. 

Yet brain action does require, perhaps we 
should say, results in an increased flow of blood 
to the brain. This blood is arterial as it flows 
to the brain and venous blood when it leaves the 
brain, showing that chemical changes — oxidation 
at least — do take place. That the effect of men- 
tal work in increasing oxidation cannot be meas- 
ured, as can the effects of physical work, may 
merely be due to the fact that the brain forms 
only two per cent of the weight of the body, hence 
the effect of its labors would be too small to notice 
in comparison with the total metabolism going on 
in the body. Thus a man thinking with relaxed 

187 



Eating for Health and Strength 

muscles would seem to show less metabolism than 
another who sat apparently still but with tensed 
muscles. For these reasons the amount and 
nature of food required to produce thought can- 
not be measured and hence the belief has arisen 
that mental work does not consume food at all. 
This conclusion can at present be neither proven 
nor disproven, and we cannot state what is the 
exact purpose or effect of this extra flow of blood 
during brain activity, but that it has a purpose, 
we cannot doubt. Moreover, we do know that 
anything that interferes with the flow of blood 
to the brain, or any impairment of any such qual- 
ity of that blood will interfere with brain action 
and reduce mental efficiency. 

Some inference might be made as to the nature 
of essential "brain food" from the fact that a lack 
of one of the vitamines causes the dull sleepiness 
which ends in paralysis, as observed in pigeons 
and other experimental animals. It is probable 
that there are essential substances, minute in 
quantity, which are consumed in brain activity 
and the lack of which may cause mental ineffi- 
ciency, insanity, and probably death. This prob- 
lem science in the future may yet unravel. 

No appreciable amount of bulkier food sub- 
stances such as ordinary proteins, carbohydrates 
and fats are concerned in brain activity. The 

188 



Food and Mental Efficiency 

brain wastes the slowest of any organ or tissues 
(with the exception of the bones) during fasting 
or starvation. Nor is the brain substance ma- 
terially impaired by fasting. Barring the dis- 
turbing elements of the sensation of hunger which 
in fasting largely disappears after the first few 
days, the brains seem to work very well without 
the usual food supply. Upton Sinclair wrote a 
play during a two weeks' fast. Dr. Benedict re- 
ports that a professional faster was in first-class 
mental condition at the end of a thirty days' fast 
and made a speech in which he gave evidence of 
a keen and wide-awake mind. 

To take up more practical considerations, we 
find that many of the world's greatest thinkers 
are light eaters and attribute their superior 
mental efficiency, in part at least, to their ab- 
stemious diet. Thomas Edison, whose record 
for long hours of high grade mental work has 
never been surpassed, insists that his capacity 
for a twenty-hour working day is due to his 
light eating habits, and his abstinence from alco- 
hol and stimulants. 

The heavy eater is unquestionably less efficient 
mentally than the man who eats just enough to 
maintain a minimum body weight and supply the 
energy for his physical activities. More particu- 
larly the effect of over-eating upon brain effi- 

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Eating for Health and Strength 

ciency can be observed immediately after the eat- 
ing of a heavy meal. In addition to the more 
general effects of over-eating we have here the 
specific effect of the withdrawal of the blood sup- 
ply from the brain to the digestive organs; the 
result is a lazy or sleepy f eeling. 

So important is this effect of the heavy meal 
upon the mental efficiency that it is generally 
recognized by efficiency experts who deal with 
high grade mental workers. One such efficiency 
engineer, in handling a large force of buyers for 
a firm in New York, laid down as a first rule that 
they should not have lunch before one o'clock; a 
second rule was that they should not consummate 
any important deal after lunch. In other words 
they should not do important business at all on 
a full stomach. In this manner he circumvented 
the practice of salesmen who were in the habit of 
taking his buyers out to lunch, giving them a 
good feed and then, over coffee and cigars, while 
they were in good humor — in other words, robbed 
of their mental alertness — putting across a good 
deal for the salesman, but a poor deal for the 
buyer's house. 

The digestion of food itself consumes energy, 
as I have elsewhere pointed out; it increases the 
total activities of the body as measured by the 
amount of oxygen consumed, but these increased 

190 



Food and Mental Efficiency 



activities, unlike those of exercise, seem to deaden 
rather than to stimulate mental activity. 

The effects of a continuous light diet upon 
the mental power were observed in the case of 
the Y. M. C. A. College men whose physical tests 
on reduced portions we have already recorded. 
These men while on half their former food sup- 
ply maintained a ranking in their college grades 
that averaged about two per cent better than their 
previous college records, with the unlimited heavy 
diet, or the records of fellow classmen not on a re- 
duced diet. Some detailed psychological tests 
seemed to show a decrease of certain mental 
powers, but there was no change sufficient to be 
observed by the men or their associates or that 
seriously interfered with their intellectual pow- 
ers. 

In their diaries many of the men remarked 
they felt freer from logginess and dullness, and 
more mentally fit; others complained that their 
increased hunger made them restless and dis- 
turbed in their studies. 

Remember that these men were living on an 
extremely restricted diet, considering the amount 
of physical exercise they were taking. The 
probable best results in mental as well as physical 
efficiency would be a happy medium of nutrition 
between the over-eating habits of the average 

191 



Eating for Health and Strength 

man, and these half rations of wartime experi- 
menters. 

While there is probably no need, in ordinary 
life, of the extreme dietetic restrictions of these 
experimental subjects, yet unquestionably light 
eating habits are essential for those who wish to 
prolong their lives and do superior mental work. 
It is equally important for the mental worker to 
arrange the proportioning of his meals so that his 
chief labors of the day will not come during those 
hours when he is digesting his chief food supply 
for the day. 

Either of the following plans will be suited to 
the worker whose mental labors are performed 
during ordinary office hours : 

PLAN I. 
No Breakfast — or at most nothing more than a cup 

of hot water, flavored, if desired, with a little 

milk or fruit juice. 
Or very light Breakfast of fruits. 

Moderate Lunch, such as light sandwiches, Whole 
Wheat Bread if possible. 
Milk 
Salad 

Full Dinner at 6 p.m. 

PLAN II. 

Moderate Breakfast — such as Fruit, fresh or evap- 
orated. 

Light Cereals 
Milk or Eggs 

Whole Wheat Bread and Butter 
192 



Food and Mental Efficiency 

At Noon — take a recreational walk 

Or at most take nothing more than a 

Glass of Milk 

An Egg-nog, or 

Fruit Juice at a Soda Fountain. 

Full Dinner at 6 p.m. 

PLAN III. 

Begin the day with some fairly active exercises, end- 
ing in a brief walk, if convenient. After a brief 
rest take a hearty breakfast. 

Breakfast: This meal should be the heartiest 
meal of the day. You can be assured of an 
appetite for it, if you follow the entire regime — 
that is, go to bed at least moderately hungry. 
This meal can consist of: 
Eggs or meat, as desired. 
Potatoes prepared to suit the taste or whatever 

other vegetable may appeal to you. 
Salad, if desired. 
Whole Wheat or hot Corn Bread and Butter. 

At one o'clock, or five or six hours after you break- 
fast, take a moderately hearty meal, depending 
entirely upon your appetite. It should not be 
as hearty as the morning meal. 
Eggs, if desired. 
Vegetables or Salad. 
Whole Wheat Bread and Butter. 
Sweet Fruits as dessert. 

No evening meal. 

If you make milk a part of your diet, take a pint or 
whatever quantity of milk you may desire at this 
time. When taking milk it is better to take a 
glass at a time and allow a few minutes to inter- 
vene between glasses. Remember, don't drink 
milk; "eat" it, as previously described. 
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Eating for Health and Strength 

Mental workers whose work need not be con- 
fined to the usual office hours, very frequently do 
their best work when other people are sleeping, 
either by sitting up at night, or preferably, by 
forming a habit of early rising. For such work- 
ers I suggest either of the following daily food 
regimes, though I strongly recommend the early 
rising habit. 

PLAN I. 

Rise very early, say from 4 to 6 A.M. 

Take a glass of hot water or a little fruit. 

Work steadily without further food until the important 
creative work of the day is done, then partake of a 
moderate meal. 



Eat supper early and spend the evening in mental recrea- 
tion, or light mental work. 



Devote the afternoon to physical recreation, or lighter work. 

Eat supper early 
tion, or ligh 

Go to bed early. 

PLAN II. 

Rise late, 8 to 10 A.M. Take vigorous morning exercise, 
followed by a bath and eat moderate late breakfast, 
or early lunch. 

Work at creative work or other occupation during the day 
without further eating. 

Have full dinner rather early in the evening. Then spend 
at least two hours in mental recreation. 

After the meal has been digested, settle down for the crea- 
tive work of the night and work as late as the mind 
will function vigorously. Sleep the next morning till 
you are fully rested. 

194 



Food and Mental Efficiency 

Let me say in conclusion that while science has 
not discovered any particular brain foods, both 
Science and practical experience teach us the 
great importance of maintaining a high degree 
of bodily efficiency as the basis of mental effi- 
ciency. The rules for mental efficiency are 
merely the rules for correct living generally; 
physical efficiency, health and long life can all 
be attained on a program of living that develops 
the best brain power. Most people are dull 
mentally because they are stuffed up from over- 
eating and under-exercise. Either proper eating 
or proper exercise will benefit mental efficiency, 
but a proper balance of both will attain the best 
results of all. 



195 



CHAPTER XIV 

Eating to Gain Weight 

F N this and the following chapter we will con- 
sider the question of eating from the stand- 
point of changing the weight of the body, but 
before one sets about to change the weight of 
the body, with the view of attaining an ideal 
weight, he, or she, should know what the ideal 
weight is. 

This question of the ideal weight must ever 
remain an individual one; no two people, even 
of the same sex are born with the same inherited 
capacities for bodily growth and development. 
Not only is there a difference in stature which 
once attained cannot be materially altered, but 
there are fundamental differences in build or 
type which should be considered. Some frames 
are heavier than others, the bones are actually 
larger; also there are differences in relative 
breadth of frame in relation to height. 

The muscular development is far more within 
the control of the individual than the skeleton, 
or the size of the vital organs. Most people 
under civilized conditions are sadly lacking in 

396 



Eatixg to Gain Weight 



muscular development ; only a very few attain the 
full, maximum muscular development of which 
they are inherently capable. Almost all men, 
and more certainly all women, could materially 
improve the muscular development by muscular 
exercise. But even with the most thorough 
regime of physical exercise there will still be 
distinct differences in the degree or heaviness of 
muscular development. Some will develop large 
and exceedingly strong muscles; others, even 
with the same exercise, will develop muscles of 
a lighter type, perhaps adapted to dexterity and 
speed or wiry endurance. When all these facts 
are considered it is seen that any table of ideal 
weights, even properly arranged for heights and 
sex, will still fail as a guide for a particular 
individual. The far better source of knowledge 
from which to determine the ideal weight is a 
well trained conception of the ideal — or more 
properly ideals — for their distinct types — of 
physical beauty. This sense for bodily beauty 
is instinctive in us all, but may be cultivated by 
the observation of such beauty, as expressed by 
painters and sculptors, or even better, as ob- 
served from the development of living individ- 
uals or their photographs. 

One point of caution only is needed — the 
ideals of physical beauty have not always been 

197 



Eating for Health and Strength 






maintained upon the basis of the admiration of 
physical efficiency or muscular development. 
The ancient Greeks did maintain such ideals 
and the imitation of their art has done much to 
preserve these ideals even in ages when the 
original ideals of physical development were lost 
to a world struggling between the puritanical 
conception that everything connected with the 
body was indecent and unclean, and the licen- 
tious conception that the only physical beauty 
was that which would stimulate passion and lust. 

The practice of the puritanical world has 
usually been to hide the body, particularly the 
female body, or to distort it with mutilations 
achieved by insane fashions in dress. Happily 
these absurdities have largely disappeared from 
the mind of the present generation and the 
styles in clothing of the present day, though by 
no means perfect, are more sensible and more 
artistic than anything that has prevailed since 
classic periods. 

The absurd fashions, now happily disappear- 
ing, seem to have had a dual purpose. On the 
one hand was the puritanical element insisting 
upon the complete hiding of the form with a 
superabundance of clothing, and on the other 
hand the licentious element which attempted to 
exaggerate the distinctive features of the female 

198 



Eating to Gain Weight 



form by restricting the waist and giving undue 
prominence to the bust and hips. 

Some of the models used by artists, in this 
age of absurdity, were of the type that unduly 
accentuated this "femininity." Though artists 
rarely consented to paint or chisel the extreme 
hour-glass waists, many artists did take their 
models from feminine types entirely too exag- 
gerated to be considered as ideals of physical 
fitness or to be considered beautiful to any other 
than the voluptuous mind. Other former paint- 
ings, especially of the Dutch artists, appear very 
ludicrous to us now, as their models were dis- 
tinctly fat. 

I dwell upon this point because I have found 
many women who think themselves under- 
weight and are always stuffing themselves in 
efforts to overcome their thinness, when as a 
matter of fact they arc eating plenty of food 
and are fat enough, though they would be im- 
proved by a better muscular development. 

In the case of men there is rarely any excuse 
for them to try to fatten themselves. With 
women we may be somewhat more lenient; al- 
though muscular development is always to be 
preferred to the acquisition of fat, yet some 
women are so built that they cannot maintain 
an attractive form wholly from the development 

199 



Eating for Health and Strength 

of muscles. For such, at least, during the pe- 
riod of youth, the carrying of a moderate pro- 
portion of fatty tissue may be worth in personal 
satisfaction any injurious effects that might be 
caused by eating the additional food required to 
maintain such development. To argue that a 
woman should be so thin as to be unattractive 
to all men, in order that she might live longer, 
is a waste of words — she wouldn't want to live 
longer. 

The most frequent cause of undue thinness 
or underweight is the lack of sufficient muscles; 
exercise and not diet must always remain the 
true remedy for such a lack. But there are 
cases in both sexes in which there is a lack of 
both fat and muscle tissue that may have a 
dietetic origin. In these instances of true under- 
nutrition, the trouble is usually not a question 
of insufficient eating, but of an impairment of 
digestion and assimilation through past dietetic 
errors. The mere effort to increase the food 
eaten may, indeed, in such cases have quite the 
opposite effect than that which is desired. 

Before giving practical dietetic instructions 
for those who wish to gain weight, I want to 
call attention to one marked distinction between 
the problem of weight-gaining and the problem 
of weight reduction. In the case of weight 

200 



Eating to Gain Weight 



reduction, dieting is a positive and infallible 
method; if one eats less of the fuel or fat form- 
ing foods than the daily functions of the body 
require, loss of weight must result. But in the 
contrary case the eating of more food will not 
always result in an increase of weight. More- 
over, while the loss of weight, for those who are 
too heavy, almost invariably results in physical 
benefit, the increase of weight on the part of 
those who are undeveloped will not be of benefit 
unless the increase is largely in the form of 
useful active tissue rather than mere fat. 

True under-nutrition may be caused either 
by lack of sufficient food, a lack of properly 
proportioned and balanced food, or, a lack of 
ability properly to assimilate food eaten. In 
any case the first thing to do is to see that the 
diet contains all the necessary food ingredients 
and contains them in approximately the correct 
proportions. A diet so selected will usually 
remedy the trouble without any particular effort 
to eat a larger quantity than natural hunger 
calls for. Such a diet combined with the general 
program of hygienic living will remedy all 
ordinary cases of under-weight. 

In particular instances where the digestion 
has been impaired, special diets will be needed 
to overcome such impairment. For this purpose 

201 



Eating for Health and Strength 

there is no diet more worthy of a trial than the 
milk diet. Milk is one of the most digestible 
of our foods and unquestionably supplies nour- 
ishment in a very efficient form for the produc- 
tion of either muscular or fatty tissue. The 
milk diet has given splendid results in thousands 
of cases of under-weight and malnutrition. 
Such gains, however, may prove to be of a 
temporary nature, if the temporary milk diet 
is not followed by a permanent regime that 
includes both proper food and sufficient exer- 
cise. 

One should not attempt to gain weight too 
rapidly, as the human being cannot be fattened 
like a pig, without producing an utterly worth- 
less form of tissue. If too great an amount of 
food is eaten the results will be quite opposite 
from weight gaining. Such deliberate over-eat- 
ing was tested by English scientists; they pre- 
scribed for several subjects a diet of about 4,500 
calories, and the subjects agreed to eat it and 
see what happened. They were healthy men, 
taking moderate exercise. For a few days they 
laid on fat rapidly. Then, in every case, the 
appetite failed and they had to force themselves 
to eat at all. They continued, however, until 
serious indigestion followed by diarrhea put 
them on the sick list. As a result they lost more 

202 



Eating to Gain Weight 



ice water. Hot drinks are usually preferable, 
though strong tea or coffee should be tabooed. 
Though not fattening, buttermilk can be used at 
each meal as a drink for a stomach tonic if it 
is appetizing. 



205 



CHAPTER XV 

Eating to Reduce Weight 

rpHROUGHOUT this book I have given 
A numerous arguments against over-eating 
and the condition of obesity which usually fol- 
lows. 

But perhaps the most convincing argument 
of all is that the fat man or woman is unsightly 
of appearance and very obviously handicapped 
in social life as well as in the more serious business 
of muscular or mental activity. Fat is no longer 
in fashion, and even a degree of fatness for- 
merly thought to be a sign of good health is 
now known to be a sign of ill health and a 
prognostication of an untimely death. 

Most convincing of these very real handicaps 
of the fat man in the race of life are the in- 
vestigations made a few years ago by the 
insurance companies of America. Hundreds of 
thousands of cases were tabulated in which the 
weights and heights of the policy holders were 
known. From the records of all policy holders 
the average weights for the various heights and 
ages were determined. All records were then 

206 



Eating to Reduce Weight 



assorted according to the percentage of individ- 
ual departure above or below these standard 
or average weight figures. The number of 
deaths in each such group were known and by 
comparing the number of deaths that actually 
did occur with the death rate to be expected 
from all individuals of similar ages, it was pos- 
sible to derive figures that show the practical 
effect of various degrees of over and under 
weight upon the death rate. 

The description of this method of investiga- 
tion may seem a little confusing to the reader, 
but he can rest assured that the life insurance 
statisticians knew what they were about. Their 
companies pay out millions of dollars on policies 
and if they make a mistake of insuring the 
wrong kind of men, or of insuring them at too 
low a rate the companies will suffer a heavy 
financial loss. There was money back of this 
effort to find the truth concerning the effect 
of the weight upon the proper length of life; 
and the truth, when found, surprised even the 
insurance experts. 

They found that over-weight, even in a mild 
degree very materially increased the death rate; 
they also found that the greater the over-weight 
the greater the increase in death rate. No sta- 
tistics were gathered for extreme cases, as these 

207 



Eating for Health and Strength 

would be too few in number to draw a general 
conclusion, but they found that men ranging 
from sixty-five to eighty-five pounds over- 
weight (which in a man of average height would 
be about 225 pounds) had, at some age periods, 
a death rate practically twice as great as men 
of normal weight. 

The increase in death rate or the danger from 
obesity was discovered to vary in degree accord- 
ing to age ; obesity is not nearly so dangerous in 
youth, and not quite so dangerous in old age, 
as it is in middle life. But at all ages extreme 
obesity increased the death rate. 

On the other hand it was found that under- 
weight is most dangerous in youth; as men 
grow older being under the average weight is 
found to be an actual advantage and results in 
a decreased death rate. Obviously the reason 
for this is that the average figures for the 
weights of all men which were taken as a stand- 
ard in this investigation do not constitute a true 
or an ideal standard. By a study of these figures 
(too complicated to give here in detail) we learn 
that young men, on the average, weigh less than 
they should, and that older men, on the average, 
weigh more than they should. The logical ex- 
planation is that young men are not so often 
too fat but have frequently undeveloped muscles, 

208 



Eating to Reduce Weight 



whereas the great majority of old men, what- 
ever be their muscular development, are too 
fat. 

Youth is a period of activity, the period in 
which growth and muscular development should 
occur. As men grow older they are naturally 
less active and some shrinkage in muscular de- 
velopment is not incompatible with health and 
efficiency. Usually what happens is that the 
muscles are allowed to shrink too much and the 
diet is not decreased in proportion as it should 
be. And again obesity invariably results. 

Tables of average weight, erroneously called 
"standard weights" show for both sexes an in- 
crease of weight with age. True standard 
weight tables should show exactly the opposite. 
The lithe and athletic form of youth is and 
always will be our ideal of physical form and 
beauty. To retain it with the passing of years 
is rather difficult, quite impossible unless youth- 
ful activities are kept up. But to camouflage 
the loss of the muscles of youth by an accumu- 
lation of fat is a trick by which we may cheat 
ourselves and our ignorant neighbors, but we 
cannot cheat Nature, and she will exact her 
recompense in the form of inefficiency, ill-health 
and premature death. 

Why then, some may ask, did "Nature" make 

209 



Eating for Health and Strength 

it so easy for us to accumulate this burden of 
fat, only to punish us for sins with which she 
tempted us? The answer is that primitive man, 
like other animals, had an uncertain and irregu- 
lar food supply, it was therefore frequently 
advantageous to him to eat more than he needed 
one day in order to carry him over the several 
days when there might be nothing at all to eat. 
Civilization has made this crude and inefficient 
method of food storage unnecessary. On the 
other hand, civilization has decreased man's need 
of physical labor which would consume, in a 
beneficial manner, a larger quantity of food 
material. Still worse, civilization has com- 
pounded thousands of dishes made of over-sea- 
soned and appetite-tempting foods, and so milled 
and cooked that they may be eaten more quickly 
and hence in larger quantities than natural food 
would be. 

As a total result of the blunders of man, we 
find ourselves with a natural temptation to eat 
more than we immediately need, with the re- 
sulting evils greatly increased by our decreased 
activities and the artificial stimulation of our 
appetites by unnatural foods. 

The remedy is the exercise of both intelli- 
gence and will-power. People who are too fat 
and know that they are too fat — who may even 

210 



Eating to Reduce Weight 



protest that they do not over-eat — do over-eat 
and continue to over-eat simply because they 
like to eat. Such people are always searching 
for some easy, lazy way to "reduce," without 
either taking exercise or restricting the diet. 
They will take any kind of a reducing pill that 
any charlatan offers them, whether it be made 
of "bread" or poison. They will go to Turkish 
baths and sweat out a little water and so tip 
the scale a pound or two less and go home very 
happy — only to get their fat back as soon as 
they have satisfied their thirst. Fat cannot be 
sweated out nor can it be rubbed off or van- 
quished by electricity, magnetism, X-rays, or 
any other form of hocus-pocus. 

Fat once deposited in the body can only be 
got rid of by burning it up, that is, by oxidizing 
it and breathing it out in the form of carbon- 
dioxide. There are two ways to achieve this 
end: one is by increased exercise, and the other 
is by the decreased consumption of fat-making 
foods which will cause the body to burn some 
of its stored fat in lieu of a shortage of fuel 
material coming directly from the food supply. 
Either of the above methods of reducing will 
work alone, but tbe two of them will work 
better together. The difficulty with attempts 
to reduce by exercise without considering the 

211 



Eating for Health and Strength 

diet is that the exercise frequently stimulates 
the appetite ; and if that is unrestrained, the 
results may be merely that the additional food 
ingredients required by the exercise are sup- 
plied by the additional food eaten. 

I advise the combination of dieting and exer- 
cises in reduction, not because it is the easier 
method, but because it is the better method. 
Obese individuals usually accumulate" their 
fat because ,of lack of exercise and the fatter 
they become the more unpleasant exercise be- 
comes and the more ungainly they look in the 
gymnasium or on the tennis court. As a result 
the fat man, and even to a greater degree the 
fat woman, is usually under-developed mus- 
cularly. 

Since additional exercise tends to stimulate 
the appetite, it might be well to begin your pro- 
gram of exercise first and continue for a few 
days, before attempting to begin a restricted 
diet program. In such case you should be care- 
ful not to change your eating habits for the 
worse. As soon as the body has begun to draw 
upon its stored fat for a fuel supply, and you 
have become accustomed to resisting the tempta- 
tion to eat all you want, you may then begin a 
systematic dietetic program for reduction. 

Exercise alone will reduce you, if you do not 

212 



Eating to Reduce Weight 



increase the food supply, but for those who are 
very fat, the method is too slow and the amount 
of exercise required is too great; on the other 
hand, dieting alone will reduce you very posi- 
tively and very rapidly, but it will not build 
up muscular tissue to take the place of the fat 
that is lost. 

The rate of reduction that may be achieved 
under dieting is not as great as some mislead- 
ing advertisements would lead us to believe; 
even under complete fasting, the loss of weight 
usually ranges from but three-quarters of a 
pound to one pound a day, although the first three 
or four days very strenuous exercise will increase 
this somewhat, but ordinarily the higher figures 
of reduction are impossible though they may 
apparently be attained for a few days when one 
first begins the restricted diet. Such temporary 
losses of weight are not due to a loss of fat, but 
only to the decrease of the weight of the food in 
progress of digestion and perhaps to some loss 
of water from the body. 

The most rapidly effective method of reduc- 
tion is, of course, a complete fast. Its chief ad- 
vantage is that it works; whereas many dietetic 
programs fail to work, merely because one fails, 
unconsciously perhaps, to adhere to them. When 
a man goes on a fast he knows positively 

213 



Eating for Health and Strength 

whether he is keeping faith with himself or not. 
Short intervals of fasting, either at the begin- 
ning of a course of reduction, or at some later 
stage, are always effective and often very bene- 
ficial, and I do not hesitate to advise them. 

The difficulties with the fasting method of 
reduction are that, from its very nature, it is 
a temporary makeshift; when one breaks the 
fast the temptation to eat all one can is very 
great, and fat can be put back almost as rapidly 
as it can be taken off. Moreover, in the case 
of those who are very much over-weight, the 
body can be starved for non-fat elements before 
the fat can be taken off by fasting. The dan- 
ger of this would, of course, be increased if the 
previous diet had been deficient in non-fat 
food essentials; which is very frequently the 
case. Long fasts as scientific experiments are 
very interesting and instructive. Under skilled 
guidance long fasts also have very great value 
as a curative agency. 

The quickest safe way to reduce is to limit 
the diet to those foods needed to supply the 
vitamines, the minerals and a sufficient though 
not excessive quantity of the high efficiency pro- 
teins. Such a diet, if selected from natural 
foods, will not be wholly lacking in food ele- 
ments from which fat can be made; hence any 

214 



Eating to Reduce Weight 



diet, if eaten in excessive quantities, will fail as 
a reducing diet. 

The ideal method of weight reduction is to 
select a diet in which fat forming elements are 
less than the usual proportions for maintain- 
ing a normal weight — and to eat of such foods 
in quantities strictly limited to the amount neces- 
sary to supply the non-fat elements. Upon 
such regimes, a number of which will be given 
in this chapter, it is possible to lose from one- 
fourth to one-half pound a day; and no matter 
what the weight to begin with, one can keep up 
such a diet until a truly ideal weight has been 
established. Then with a moderate addition of 
the fuel foods the essential diet may be continued 
without any radical break or change which would 
tempt one to go back to his former eating 
habits. 

In planning the diet for reduction there are 
a few other points that should be noted. It is 
desirable that the restrictions be made in a form 
that will cause the least privation from hunger 
and offer the least temptation to over-eating. 
The use of foods of a bulky nature will aid 
in this matter both because the mind will not 
note the seeming scarcity of food so readily, nor 
will the digestive tract feel so empty; hence 
bulky vegetables and pulpy or juicy fruits 

215 



Eating for Health and Strength 

should constitute a large proportion of the re- 
ducing diet. Their use in such case is also quite 
in harmony with our desire to supply ample 
quantities of vitamines and minerals, and to 
promote a vigorous intestinal action, thus pre- 
venting constipation, which might otherwise oc- 
cur from a decrease in the accustomed quantity 
of food. 

A second consideration is that foods should 
be used that require mastication, and that pains 
should be taken to eat slowly and masticate all 
foods. A given quantity of food which requires 
thirty minutes to eat will be much more satisfy- 
ing and more thoroughly appease hunger than 
if the same quantity of food were disposed of 
in five or ten minutes. 

A third consideration is that one should not 
eat too often — or at least one should not sit 
down to a full spread meal too often. This 
may be purely a matter of habit, but it is rather 
difficult for most of us to "quit in the middle 
of a meal. ,, It is much easier to skip the meal 
entirely. As a general thing I should advise 
the adoption of the two-meal a day plan for 
all those who are over-weight. A still better 
plan during active reduction would be to have 
only one regular meal, by which I mean a meal 
with a variety of courses. The other "meal" or 

216 



Eating to Reduce Weight 



meals as it may be in this case should consist 
of one or two definite items, such as, a glass 
of milk, an orange or a salad, when it is no 
temptation at all to over-eat because no gen- 
eral meal is set before one. 

You will frequently meet with so-called re- 
ducing diets, in which the essential advice given 
is to refrain from certain particular foods. The 
publication of such half scientific matter has 
been to convey the notion that certain foods 
are "fattening." Among those that have fallen 
under the taboo are potatoes, sugar and, of 
course, fat meat, pastries and confections. 
These foods are no more fattening than scores 
of others that might be mentioned. Eliminat- 
ing them from the diet will be effective only 
in case they have been eaten to excess in the 
past, and one eliminates then without putting 
other equally fattening foods in their places. 
There is no necessity for strictly avoiding any 
one food in a reducing program. Particularly 
in the case of potatoes, a comparatively inno- 
cent food has suffered a most unfair reputa- 
tion, and merely because so many people eat po- 
tatoes in wholly uncalled-for quantities. Most 
of these so-called fattening foods are eaten in ex- 
cess, and the quantity should be reduced or the 
food entirely eliminated. Where the practical 

217 



Eating foe Health and Strength 

joke comes from such notions is that the fat 
man most religiously abstains from the tabooed 
food and then wonders why he does not get 
thin, and perhaps concludes that all dietetic 
writers are fakers. I have seen men whose 
waists were bigger than their chests very care- 
fully put a saccharine pill into their coffee, to 
avoid a teaspoonful of sugar, or perhaps refuse 
a potato in the manner of a Methodist preacher 
from Kansas rejecting a Scotch highball — and 
then consume a meal that would have foundered 
a champion pugilist. 

Some typical weight-reducing menus: 

REDUCING MENUS 

Breakfast Breakfast 

Cereal Coffee Shredded Wheat with berries 

Soft Boiled Egg Glass of Buttermilk or a hot 

A slice of Whole Wheat drink 
Toast 

Lunch Lunch 

Glass of Buttermilk Baked Potatoes without But- 

A Green Salad ter 

Stewed Carrots or Onions A piece of Broiled Fish or 

Young Chicken 
A Green Salad 

Dinner Dinner 

Chipped Creamed Beef Clear Vegetable Soup 

Bran or Corn Muffins A large dish of Greens fla- 

Tomatoes, sliced or stewed vored with Lemon Juice 

Dessert or a salad dressing 

Ham or Dried Beef 
A Fruit Juice drink 
218 



Eating to Reduce Weight 



Breakfast 
An Orange 

Lunch 

Glass of Buttermilk 
Lettuce, Tomato Salad with 

Cottage Cheese Dressing 

without Oil 
A few hard Crackers 

Dinner 

Vegetable Soup 

Bran Muffins 

Asparagus or String Beans 

A few Nut Meats eaten with 

Celery; 
Fruit Sherbet or Punch 
(not sweet) 



Breakfast 

A few soaked Prunes or 
A glass of Buttermilk 

Lunch 
Plenty of Spinach with one 

Egg 
Glass of Milk 
Apple Sauce with slice of 

Whole Wheat Bread 

Dinner 

Oyster Soup without Butter 

Celery or 

Graham Muffins 

A Baked Potato with Salt 

A few Nuts eaten with two 

or three Figs 
Grape Juice 



219 



CHAPTER XVI 
Food and the Sexual Life 

THITHER considered as a social problem, or 
'^ as an individual and personal problem, the 
sexual life is vitally important in its relation to 
health, happiness, morality, and racial welfare. 
Any light that can be shed on this subject by 
science or practical human observation should 
be welcomed as ranking with the most important 
knowledge that man can acquire. 

My own attitude favors the open and frank 
discussion of sexual problems, and my opposi- 
tion to all prudery that would shield vice and 
disease by a veil of ignorance is too well known 
to require any apology here for the discussion 
of the effect of food upon the sexual life. 

Many years ago I learned that over-eating 
and the use of stimulating foods led to an un- 
natural increase of the sexual passion of man, 
and hence were instrumental in the increase of 
vice and disease. I further learned that the use 
of a natural vegetarian diet and the elimination 
of meat, together with a general reduction of the 
quantity of food eaten, were very valuable aids 

220 



Food and the Sexual Life 



in controlling the sexual passions, and enabling 
men to lead clean, moral lives. 

Although this knowledge has long been a part 
of the general program of clean and healthful 
living, which I have advocated and taught, no 
account of investigation of this problem by sys- 
tematic scientific experiment had been reported 
until the result of the war-time investigations of 
a restricted diet were published. 

The problem of the effect of food on the 
sexual life was not one of those Dr. Benedict 
and his associates started out to investigate, 
but the facts in this connection that came to 
light as a result of their experiments are exceed- 
ingly interesting and important. 

The men in this experiment were taking 
courses of training for work as Y. M. C. A. 
Secretaries or Physical Directors. Both groups 
were well educated in sexual matters and were 
mature men living clean, normal lives and with 
a wholesome and intelligent attitude toward 
sex matters. Therefore, the evidence given by 
them is much more valuable than that which 
could be secured from an ordinary group of 
men, who would have been prudish and ashamed 
to reveal any evidence in regard to their sexual 
desires. 

On the other hand, it should be noted that the 
221 



Eating fob Health and Strength 

scientists having this experiment in charge had 
not thought of this phase of the problem and, 
therefore, nothing had been said regarding it to 
the men, which might have prejudiced their 
observations. The matter came to their atten- 
tion quite by chance from one of the subjects 
who volunteered a statement that the effect of 
the restricted diet had been to eliminate all sex- 
ual desire. Therefore, the scientists in charge, 
without previously discussing the matter with 
the men, secured by private and individual in- 
terviews statements regarding the effect of the 
low diet upon their sexual natures. 

The agreement of the reports of these men 
was astonishingly uniform upon this subject. 
All of the twelve men reported a general de- 
crease of sex interests. 

Upon the reports regarding the more specific 
physical expressions, the majority gave quite 
definite proof of less tendency to uncontrolled 
expression of the sexual nature, as in seminal 
losses, sexual dreams, etc., as commonly expe- 
rienced by unmarried men. 

Here are a few extracts from the interviews 
that reveal the general experience of the men: 

"I think there is a relation between the low diet 
and the sex instinct. . . . This winter I made 
on an average two visits a week to my fiancee, 

222 



Food and the Sexual Life 



Before the experiment when with her I noticed (I 
hope she did not) much sex stimulation. 
When visiting my fiancee during the low diet period 
nothing of a sex nature came to my mind. . . . 
It has been so long since I had a sex dream that 
I have no recollection of any." 

"I would swear that a low diet greatly reduces 
sexual feeling. I noticed this myself before talk- 
ing to any one about it. . . . Jokes and stories 
which might commonly have a sex appeal were 
devoid of interest." 

"I am very definite in the conviction that there 
is a reduction in sexual desire during a low diet. 
. I think the kind of food also affects the 
sex appetite — meat causing a stimulation of it. I 
do not recall any nocturnal emissions during the 
diet. Before the diet these were rather frequent. 
I have usually to put up a stiff fight against the 
sex instinct, and noticed that it was not nearly so 
difficult to control during the experiment. I slept 
better — love scenes had less effect upon me." 

"The most definite change in sexual matters 
noticed during the experimental period was that 
stories and suggestive jokes where the sexual ele- 
ment might have been prominent were repulsive. 
I was surprised at this." 

"I am sure that during the diet period sex de- 
sires, particularly as associated with dances .... 
were decidedly less. At a dance attended during 
the diet I noticed no sex desire or irritation, which 
was quite unusual for me and impressed on me 
that there was a change of some sort." 

All of these data back up in a most con- 
vincing manner the principle that I have long 

223 



Eating for Health and Strength 



believed and taught. The sexual life of man 
is unquestionably directly influenced by his eat- 
ing habits. Let us consider for a moment why 
this should be so. 

Both the physical and mental processes of 
life and the laws that govern them we believe 
to be the result of long ages of evolution. The 
basic laws apply to all living species, but the 
detailed laws vary somewhat with each species. 
Primitive man was more closely akin in his 
habits to other animal species than is civilized 
man; but even in the case of the human race as 
it exists under civilization, the general physio- 
logical laws and fundamental instincts are un- 
questionably very similar to those that apply to 
animal species. 

Consider now the probable effect of food 
scarcity or food abundance upon the existence 
and welfare of any species. If food were scarce 
and the species continued to breed and multiply 
excessively, it would result in a still greater 
food scarcity for each individual, and hence 
endanger the life of the whole race. But if 
reproduction was restricted and food was scarce 
then the result would be a greater abundance 
of food for each member of the species, race or 
tribe, and a better chance of survival. 

On the other hand, were food abundant, then 
224 



Food and the Sexual Life 



excessive reproduction would be an advantage 
to the species as it would favor its growth and 
spread and dominance over other species, races 
or tribes. But if in ages of food abundance, 
reproduction was not stimulated then the species 
or tribe would fail to make use of this favorable 
factor for its increase and its conquest of the 
earth. 

From these considerations we may compre- 
hend why in the long periods of evolution an 
increase in the sexual instinct and its expres- 
sion became associated with food abundance, and 
why excessive eating stimulates the sexual pas- 
sions. 

Man, because of the possession of a dexterous 
hand combined with a superior intelligence 
found out many ways to increase his natural 
food supplies, and to conquer and overcome the 
inferior animal species. Because of this, man 
became dominant in the world and developed 
what we call civilization, one of the essential 
and necessary facts of which is the production 
of comparative abundance of food for the race. 
Many generations with food abundance has 
developed the sexual instinct of man to a degree, 
that, as compared with other species, may be 
considered somewhat abnormal. Wild animals 
rarely breed except in the natural "mating sea- 

225 



Eating for Health and Strength 

son" which usually coincides with their period 
of greatest food abundance. Man, living under 
the artificial conditions of civilization, has lost 
the instinct of such a mating season, and doubt- 
less one of the factors in this change has 
been the abundant year-round food supply. As 
further evidence of this explanation of man's 
change of sexual habit, we find that domestic 
animals, artificially supplied with food by man, 
also lose their natural mating season, and breed 
freely at all times. 

These interesting explanations of the rela- 
tion of food on reproduction are, of course, 
rather far removed from the problem of the 
individual, but the fact remains as an inheritance 
from this past experience of the race, that 
the eating habits of the individual do directly 
influence the nature of sexual instincts. It is 
not to be expected that the sexual habits of 
civilized man can be brought back to the sea- 
sonal mating instincts of the wild animals, but 
as an individual and personal problem the ques- 
tion of the degree of sex passion is vital in the 
lives of all. 

Those who continue to over-eat and indulge 
in an abundance of meat and other stimulating 
food will find their sexual passions artificially 
stimulated. This will lead either to a greater 

226 



Food axd the Sexual Life 



struggle in the suppression of the sexual in- 
stinct, or to a greater indulgence, which too 
often is destructive not only of morality, but 
may become a drain on the general health and 
vitality, or a seriously disturbing factor in the 
intellectual life. 

Those who desire to restrain this excess of 
sexual passions will find an abstemious diet 
most helpful. The reverse principle that an 
increase in the amount of food or an increase 
of meat or other stimulating foods, will increase 
sexual passions is also obviously true. The 
application of this knowledge must of course 
remain a problem for the individual to work 
out according to his own moral standards and 
personal relations. I would point out, how- 
ever, to any who might see fit consciously to 
indulge in over-eating as a means of stimulating 
a sexual life for the purposes of indulgent pleas- 
ures, that there may be other facts to reckon 
with. As will be clearly shown in the last 
chapter, the effect of over-eating is to cause 
man to live his life at a higher pressure and 
hence shorten his years. We have good cause to 
believe, both from the standpoint of scientific 
reasoning and practical observation, that what 
is true of the general life, is also true of sexual 
life; it is a case of "a fast life and a merry 

227 



Eating for Health and Strength 

one," or *'eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow 
we die." 

As in the entire matter of living so in the 
sexual life, the individual problem becomes one 
of indulgence versus temperance ; enduring vital- 
ity and a prolonged happiness versus a greedy 
effort to grasp all the pleasures of living at once, 
and an indifference to the future that recks not 
of the days of disease, decay and death. 



228 



CHAPTER XVII 

Feeding the Baby 

fT^HE best food for the baby is mother's milk. 
A There may be a few exceptions. There are 
occasionally instances where the mother does 
not furnish sufficient milk and then there are 
some instances when the milk does not properly 
nourish the baby. But the breast-fed baby usu- 
ally has more vitality than those fed with the 
bottle. 

The protein of the mother's milk as well as its 
other food ingredients is superior for the nour- 
ishment of the child to any foods derived from 
other sources. In spite of all the development of 
the science of infant feeding by the modification 
of cow's milk the fact remains that breast-nour- 
ished babies always are and probably always will 
be the best nourished. 

Civilized woman's failure to nourish her child, 
whether this be a matter of her own decision, 
or necessitated by the artificial condition of her 
life, is one of the crimes of civilization. Pages 
of statistics might be quoted as to the greater 

229 



Eating for Health and Strength 

death rates and inferior health and growth of the 
artificially nourished baby. Happily, however, 
for the mother who cannot nourish her child, it 
should be stated that the chief loss of child life 
through artificial feeding is due to carelessness 
and ignorance. And while natural nursing is 
always preferable, artificial feeding can be made 
fairly safe and efficient. 

If the Mother cannot nourish the baby, the 
next best food is cow's milk or goat's milk. 

The high mortality record which prevails 
among infants is due largely to the mistakes 
made by mothers who are unable to feed their 
children by natural methods, that is, from the 
breast. There are all sorts of formulas advo- 
cated for feeding bottle babies. Although many 
of them may be of value, in the end, one usually 
learns, as the result of experience, that the sim- 
ple combination of cow's milk, sugar of milk and 
the juice of an orange will form a basis for a 
baby's diet which cannot be improved upon. 
There may be occasional instances where lime 
water may be essential, though as a rule when 
the proper quantity of orange juice is furnished 
the lime water is not needed. 

The use of cow's milk, as stated, can be con- 
tinued without any other additions than those 
mentioned, until a baby's mouth is literally full 



Feeding the Baby 



of teeth. Then, of course, it is ready for solid 
food. 

Very hard bread, like zwieback or food of this 
nature can be used occasionally to encourage 
the inclination of the infant to chew and also 
may help in the teeth-cutting process. As out- 
lined in the table which will follow, when an 
infant is very young the quantity of cream must 
be greatly increased. In fact when it is a few 
days old the food should consist largely of 
cream, diluted with water and with sugar of 
milk as stated. As it grows older the quan- 
tity of cream can be gradually decreased until 
the full cow's milk is being used. The exact 
time when this change should be made will de- 
pend largely upon the vitality of the infant. 
Usually the sooner it can be made the more 
advantageous it will be to the baby. 

It is quite frequent in infant feeding to neg- 
lect to give a sufficient quantity of water of the 
proper sort. Pure water is absolutely essential. 
Distilled water is usually best, though boiled 
water which has been aerated is satisfactory. 

And please remember that the best distilla- 
tion process is furnished by nature in the rain 
that falls from the clouds. Naturally in the 
city, this rain is usually quite dirty, but rain 
which has been taken from a clean roof and 



Eating for Health and Strength 

stored away in a clean vault not only makes a 
perfect drinking water but is the most satisfac- 
tory water for a baby. If your roof in the 
country is allowed first of all thoroughly to 
cleanse itself with the beginning of a rain, the 
rain that falls thereafter can be enclosed in a 
clean vault and this sort of water for human 
use cannot be improved upon. 

When water is first given to a baby (use a 
bottle) it is usually desirable to sweeten it with 
sugar of milk. This encourages the child to 
begin taking the water, and the sugar of milk 
can be gradually lessened, unless you are feed- 
ing the child with cow's milk, and in that case 
a certain amount of sugar of milk is essential 
thoroughly to nourish the child. 

As soon as an infant secures sufficient diges- 
tive power to be thoroughly nourished, it is 
usually better gradually to change its feeding 
to full cow's milk, one feeding to be given every 
three or four hours, though water should be 
given half way in between feedings, sweetened 
with sugar of milk. 

As showing the tremendous importance of 
water for an infant, I remember prescribing on 
one occasion for a baby that was little more than 
a skeleton. It was about eight months old and 
weighed a little over seven pounds. After mak- 

232 



Feeding the Baby 



ing careful inquiries as to the methods which 
had been used in feeding the infant I concluded 
that they were not giving it sufficient water. It 
was actually "drying up" for the need of water. 
I prescribed from six to eight ounces of cow's 
milk every three or four hours and the same 
quantity of water sweetened with sugar of milk, 
half way between each feeding. 

As a result of this change in its feeding habits, 
the infant almost immediately began to gain 
a pound a week and continued gaining until it 
had acquired normal weight. 

Perhaps the greatest of all mistakes that are 
made in the feeding of infants is the inclination 
of the average mother to over-feed. Whenever 
a child fails to gain proper vitality, every in- 
ducement is made to increase the amount of 
food taken. This tendency, itself, in many 
cases is the actual cause of serious diseases. 
Over-feeding tends to bring about digestive 
defects and interferes materially with proper 
assimilation. What the child really needs is a 
digestive rest and while it is taking this rest it 
can be given water freely, but milk should be 
avoided altogether. This can be continued from 
one to three days with perfect safety. In 
fact, where necessary, this fasting regime can 
safely be continued even beyond this period. 

233 



Eating fok Health and Strength 

The average mother is, of course, afraid to 
fast her infant even for a day, but in many cases 
this is really the only means to bring about a 
change for the better. I have often fasted my 
own infants from one to three days when but 
a few months old. Such a fast can be made 
entirely comfortable by giving the infant water 
sweetened with sugar of milk or with a small 
amount of strained honey. 

When giving water to a baby it should always 
be given in a bottle the same as the milk. If 
the baby is given sweetened water, as stated 
above, it will not notice the fast. It will be 
about as comfortable as when feeding; in fact, 
in many instances more comfortable when it 
needs a fasting regime of this sort. 

In the case of bottle-fed babies, mothers often 
make the mistake of using nipples that allow 
the baby to secure the milk too quickly. 
Usually the slower the milk is taken the more 
readily it is digested, and the more benefit the 
infant secures from it. It is possible to use an 
opening in a nipple that is too small, but if the 
child takes about ten minutes for each feed- 
ing it is far better than if the milk is gulped 
down. 

Be sure to avoid feeding too soon after a 
physical disorder of any kind. Wait for the 

234 



Feeding the Baby 



child's appetite to assert itself. It is usually 
safer to begin with water, sweetened as stated, 
than it is with milk or other foods. As already 
stated, orange juice or the juice of some other 
fresh fruits should always be used if the baby 
is not breast-fed and in fact, even breast-fed 
babies can sometimes be benefited by its use. 
Don't use bottled juices or juices from canned 
fruits. In fact, orange juice is usually much safer 
than other fruit juices. From half to a whole 
orange is usually sufficient. If it is given to 
the baby in spoonfuls at different times of the 
day, it is usually more advantageous than if given 
at one feeding. As a rule a child craves this acid 
fruit juice, indicating the need in the system for 
the elements that it contains. 

The tables which follow herewith should be 
taken merely as a suggestion. The quantity 
of the food depends largely upon the size of the 
infant, its vitality, etc. As a rule the safest 
way is to feed an infant as long as it takes 
the milk hungrily, that is, is eager for it. You 
can then usually be assured that it is not taking 
too much. But when it begins to play with its 
food or turns away from it the meal should 
end there. Furthermore, food that is taken 
eagerly is digested far better. The stomach is 
then ready to take care of it and all the organs 

235 



Eating for Health and Strength 

are in a condition properly to perform their 
functions. 

In fact, this is an excellent guide for a mother 
as to when a child will need a fast: when it 
begins to "go off" its appetite. Then, as a rule, 
it is a good plan to drop one or two feedings 
and give it a chance to get its appetite back. 
If you fail to do this and continue to force food 
upon it and encourage it in other ways to take 
food, you are treading on dangerous ground. 
It is under circumstances of this nature that a 
baby contracts illnesses of various kinds. In 
nearly every serious illness, you will first of all 
notice the baby begins to turn aside from its 
food. This increases until it refuses nourish- 
ment altogether. If you will refuse nourish- 
ment when it first begins to turn aside from 
food, you will, in a great many cases, divert 
dangerous illnesses. 

You will note in the table on page 238 that we 
suggest that whole milk be given from three to 
four months and thereafter. It can, in some 
cases, be given before this and in some instances 
this is too soon to use whole milk but, as pre- 
viously stated, the sooner you can begin to 
use whole milk with water in between milk 
feeding, the faster the child will gain in health 
and strength. Begin the water feedings very 

236 



Feeding the Baby 



early in the child's life. Always feed water 
from a bottle, though when an infant is very 
young and is breast-fed a spoonful of water 
now and then is often of great value. 

When a child is crying, in many instances a 
little warm water given with a spoon will bring 
about a feeling of comfort that will quickly 
induce sleep. Crying of an infant in every 
case indicates discomfort of some sort, and moth- 
ers who have frequent trouble with their infants 
during the night have only themselves to blame. 
A child that is properly fed and properly cared 
for in every way rarely cries, especially at 
night. 

As soon as possible, the habit of feeding the 
infant all through the night should be discon- 
tinued. The last feeding should be about nine 
or ten o'clock when the mother retires, and the 
next feeding very early in the morning. One 
can break an infant into habits of this nature 
as early as two months and in some cases 
earlier. Naturally as long as you continue 
feeding during the night, the stomach will de- 
mand it and the baby will cry for it. 

When you come to the time that you want 
to discontinue night feedings, if, instead of milk, 
you simply give water, the stomach will soon 
cease its nocturnal demands. 

237 



Eating for Health and Strength 

In making this change, it is often necessary to 
allow the child to cry itself to sleep one or two 
nights when it wakes for its regular feeding, 
though, as a rule, this is all the inconvenience 
associated therewith. 

TABLE FOR BOTTLE FEEDING OF AVERAGE 
INFANT 

TOP- MILK LIME BOILED 

AGE MILK SUGAB WATER OB DIS- AMOUNT 

IF TILLED OF EACH 

NEEDED WATEB FEEDING 

OZ. OZ. OZ. OZ. OZ. • 

Up to 1 month 5 1 1 15 1% to 2 

1 to 2 months 7 1 1 15 2 to 3 

2 to 3 months 10 1 1 15 3 to 4 

(WHOLE 
MILK) 

3 to 4 months 15 1 1 15 4 to 5 

4 to 6 months 20 1 1 15 5 to 6l/ 2 

7 to 10 months 25 1 1 10 7 to 8 

10 months and upward 32 1 1 8 8 to 10 

(1 Quart) 

Water can be aerated by pouring from one 
pitcher to another or from one vessel to another. 
Water is more perfectly aereated by nature 
when it falls as rain. Boiled water should 
especially be aereated before it is fed to the 
infant. Otherwise it will taste dead and flat. 

You will note our reference to the top milk. 
We mean that from a quart bottle on which 
the cream has been allowed to rise you should 

238 



Feeding the Baby 



pour the quantity stated. You will note that 
when the infant is from three to four months 
old we have indicated the use of whole milk. 
This, however, should be only tried as an experi- 
ment at this age. If the child thrives with the 
change then continue it, or if the diet is not 
satisfactory, increase the amount of cream 
slightly. I have seen whole milk taken by an 
infant as early as two months of age with satis- 
factory results. 

When orange juice is used and it is of satis- 
factory quality, in many instances lime water 
is not needed. If the child does not seem 
to digest the milk, that is, it "throws it back" 
then the value of lime water should be tested. 
If the child seems to thrive better with the 
lime water even when orange juice is used, it 
is desirable of course that you continue its use. 



239 



CHAPTER XVIII 

The Feeding of Children 

rpHE principles of the correct feeding of chil- 
dren are in some ways quite different from 
the laws of feeding the adult. These distinc- 
tions are based chiefly on the fact that the 
children grow while adults do not. 

This fact of growth is exceedingly important 
and must in no wise be overlooked. It is a 
general law of life that the primary business of 
the young creature is to grow. In some species 
the growing period is distinctly marked off 
from the period of maturity. In bees, for in- 
stance, the young larvse is fed on "bee-bread" 
made from the pollen of the flowers, and rich 
in protein. When the larvse of the bee goes 
through the transformation stage and comes 
out as an adult insect, it ceases entirely to eat its 
former food; in fact, it is incapable of doing so. 
The adult bee lives on honey, which is almost 
wholly a fuel food. In the case of some insects 
whose adult life is briefer, no food whatever 
is taken in the adult period. 

In the higher animals no such sharp distinc- 
240 



The Feeding of Children 



tion marks off the period of growth from that 
of maturity, but to a certain extent the nutri- 
tional laws which more sharply divide these 
periods in insect life apply to the higher species. 

In addition to the growth factor there are 
certain other differences between childhood and 
maturity; the body of a child, being smaller, the 
heat lost by radiation of the surface is greater 
in proportion to the weight of the body. The 
pulse in childhood is more rapid and the speed 
of the general physiological activities is greater. 
These facts, together with the fact of growth, 
necessitate that the child consume more food 
in proportion to its weight than the adult — in 
fact — this rate of food consumption according 
to weight is for a young child three times as 
great as the adult's. 

A further distinction between childhood and 
maturity, and a distinction that is exaggerated 
by civilized conditions, is that the child is physi- 
cally more active — in fact, the normal, healthy 
child, given proper facilities for play, prefers to 
be physically active during all its waking hours. 
But the civilized adult, because of the develop- 
ment in his mental life, the routine of his busi- 
ness, and the restrictions of clothing, housing 
and customs, ceases this varied activity, and per- 
forms his physical toil and even his artificial 

241 



Eating for Health and Strength 

play at stated hours and set times. Often he 
ceases to play altogether, and muscular activity 
ceases to be essential to his labors. Under these 
conditions the civilized adult is usually over-fed 
and under-exercised — hence the main burden of 
this book, as far as the eating habits of the 
adult are concerned, is to caution against over- 
eating and find ways to prevent obesity. 

With the child, when normal physical activity 
is permitted and encouraged, obesity is more 
rare. Because of the child's activity and its 
greater food needs, over-eating, while it does 
occur among children, is not so prevalent as 
among adults. On the other hand under-eat- 
ing, which is rare among adults, at least those 
who are prosperous and have food available, 
is much more likely to occur among growing 
children. 

Because of their smaller bodies, more physi- 
ological activities and greater food needs, chil- 
dren require food more frequently than adults. 
The conventional three meals a day often rep- 
resent too frequent eating for the adult, though 
it is usually ideal for the child. A child should 
never be allowed to piece between meals, though 
moderate quantity of acid fruit can with benefit 
usually be given at any time desired, and his 
meal program intelligently adapted to his needs. 



The Feeding of Children 



Children are frequently under-nourished. 
Among the poorer classes this may be caused 
by an insufficient quantity of food. But among 
both poor and prosperous children are fre- 
quently under-nourished because of an improper 
quality of food. As with adults so with chil- 
dren : they may eat plenty and still be under-fed. 
Moreover, they may be fat and still be under- 
fed with those elements essential to health, vital- 
ity and proper growth. 

Most alarming facts have recently been 
brought to light in regard to this question of the 
proper nourishment of children. Malnutrition 
and under-nourishment are the most serious con- 
ditions that can affect a growing child, and this 
crime against childhood is one of the most 
serious things that can affect human society. 
For the child it means the stunting of growth, 
impairment of health and lessened resistance to 
disease and particularly encourages a predisposi- 
tion to tuberculosis. In America to-day every 
seventh child dies before the end of the first 
year, and two of the remaining six die before 
reaching maturity — and America is the best fed 
nation is the world. In some of the poorer 
districts in our large cities as high as seventy 
per cent of children are found to be suffering 
from malnutrition. Not so many were actually 



Eating for Health and Strength 

underfed as improperly fed. Even in the most 
fashionable schools in well-to-do neighborhoods 
forty per cent of the children have been found 
suffering from malnutrition, yet all these chil- 
dren had more than enough food placed before 
them three times a day, but the food was not 
of the proper quality, or the children did not eat 
enough because they were pampered, under-ex- 
ercised or their appetites ruined by improper 
food indulgence. 

Discussing the food problem of the adult we 
showed that to prescribe the exact amount of 
food was foolish, and that the proper way to 
judge how much one should eat was by observa- 
tion of the weight, or, more accurately, the condi- 
tion of the body. It is equally foolish to pre- 
scribe the exact amount of food for children. 
With the child as with the adult, the condi- 
tion of the body is a necessary criterion in 
determining whether the child is properly nour- 
ished or not, but with the child there is one 
additional factor that should be considered, and 
that is the rate of growth. 

In the case of adults I refrain from giving 
tables of ideal heights and weights, because I 
believe that the careful study of the physique 
is a better method from which to arrive at a 
proper conception of the weight of the body. 

244 



The Feeding of Children 



In the case of children I believe that tables will 
be valuable. Once maturity is reached there 
should be little change in body weight, but the 
child constantly growing should be ever chang- 
ing the body weight; hence the need of knowing 
what this rate of change should be. 

I will first give a table showing the average 
rate of growth or normal increase of weight 
in pounds during each year of growth — of 
course, the figures can be computed for shorter 
time periods. 

NORMAL RATE OF GROWTH FOR CHILDREN 

BOYS GIRLS 

POUNDS POUNDS 

First year 13 13 

Second year 5 5 

Third year 4l/ 2 4% 

Fourth year 4 4 

Fifth year 4 4 

Sixth year 4 4 

Seventh year 4 4 

Eighth year 4<y 2 4>y 2 

Ninth year 5 4% 

Tenth year 5% 5 

Eleventh year 5% 6 

Twelfth year 6 8 

Thirteenth year 7 11 

Fourteenth year 9 11 

Fifteenth year 12 9 

Sixteenth year 15 6 

Seventeenth year 11 4 

Eighteenth year 6 3 

Nineteenth year ........ 4 2 

245 



Eating eor Health and Strength 

The rate of growth is the most important of all 
factors in determining the nutrition of children. 
If this increase of weight was always that of 
vital active tissue no further figures would be 
needed, but children can get fat and during 
such fatting periods they would appear to be 
properly nourished when they were really not 
growing; likewise, if past accumulations of fat 
were being lost, children might seem to be ceas- 
ing to grow when in reality they were growing 
all right. Because of these facts it is desirable 
also to have at hand a table giving both heights 
and weights in relation to age. For this pur- 
pose I am using tables published in the Physical 
Culture Magazine and furnished by the New 
York City Department of Health. 

All the above figures are average figures de- 
termined from the weighing and measuring 
large groups of children. Some children may, 
of course, grow more rapidly. The average is 
rarely the ideal. However, rapidity in the 
physical growth of a child is not necessarily an 
advantage. The most highly developed races 
reach their maturity more slowly than do the 
inferior races; in fact, one of the greatest dis- 
tinctions between man and other kindred species 
is his slower rate of growth. This has come 
about during the period of man's evolution due 

246 



The Feeding of Children 



to the development of his greater brain power. 
The brain grows slowly and the process of 
acquiring the vast amount of knowledge and 
experience needed by a civilized man requires 
time. The reaching of physical maturity before 
the period of mental maturity is not an ad- 
vantage, but may prove a serious disadvantage 
in life. Hence the standard of average rates 
of growth may be considered as approximately 
ideal rates; any falling below this standard 
is a serious matter that should be at once cor- 
rected, but there is no occasion for attempting 
to stimulate growth at an excessive rate as one 
might do in the feeding of young farm stock. 

You have already learned from the discus- 
sion of the chemical nature of foods that pro- 
tein is the material of growth, and that protein 
foods vary in quality, those from milk and eggs 
being the best proteins for human nutrition. 

Returning to the subject of the nature of 
growth foods and the importance of protein in 
the child's diet, I will call your attention to the 
fact that it is the quality of protein which 
needs attention rather than the quantity. 
Mother's milk is not as rich in protein as the 
milk of the cow because the young human does 
not grow as rapidly as the calf. There is no 
more protein in proportion to other elements 

247 



Eating for Health and Strength 



HEIGHT AND WEIGHT TABLE FOR BOYS 

The standard or normal weight for a boy is found where the horizontal column 
opposite his height crosses the vertical column under his age.* Illustration — The 
standard weight for a boy 57 inches high and 13 years old is 83 pounds. 



Height 
Inches 




CO 


E 


00 


i 


© 


B 

r-t 


CO 

CM 


CO 


GO 


to 


E 

CO 




CO 


39 


35 
37 
39 
41 
43 
45 


38 
40 
42 
44 
45 
47 
49 


44 
46 
47 
50 
51 
53 


48 
50 
52 
54 
55 
58 
60 


52 
55 
56 
59 
61 
64 
67 
70 


57 
59 
62 
65 
68 
71 
74 
77 


62 
65 
68 
71 
75 
79 
81 
84 


68 
72 
76 
79 
82 
85 
88 
90 


76 
80 
83 
87 
89 
92 
97 
100 
104 


84 

88 

91 

94 

99 

102 

106 

112 

118 


92 
95 

100 
104 
108 
113 
119 
123 
125 
130 


101 
105 
109 
115 
121 
124 
126 
131 
134 
136 


110 
117 
122 
125 
127 
133 
136 
140 
142 




40 




41 

42 




43 

44 

45 




46 






47 






48 








49 








50 










51 










52 










53 












54 












55 












56 














57 














58 
















59 
















60 


















61 


















62 




















63 




















64 


















1?0 


65 




















ra 


66 




















127 


67 






















131 


68 






















136 


69 






















139 


70 
























143 


71 
























145 































* Note — The age is taken at the nearest birthday. 

Only scales with bar and weights should be used. Spring scales with dial 
face are not very durable and are likely to get out of order soon. 

Measurements for height should be taken with the child standing with feet 
close together and close against the measuring rod, or a measuring tape may be 
tacked against a wall and a book placed on the child's head, edgewise, to mark his 
height. 

248 



The Feeding of Children 



HEIGHT AND WEIGHT TABLE FOR GIRLS 

The standard or normal weight for a girl is found where the horizontal column 
opposite her height crosses the vertical column under her age. Illustration — The 
standard weight for a girl 50 inches high and 9 years old is 59 pounds. 



Height 
Inches 


05 
>< 


03 
S-c 


2 

1> 


03 
(h 

00 


«3 

C5 


CO 

Fh 

o 


oj 

(h 

K- 1 




03 

CO 


o5 

Fh 

TJ4 


u 


03 


03 


3 

CO 


39 


34 
35 
39 
41 
43 
45 


37 

39 

42 
44 
46 

47 
48 


42 
44 
46 
47 
49 
50 
52 


47 
50 
51 
53 
55 
57 


53 
54 
56 
59 
61 
65 


57 

60 
62 
66 
68 
70 


63 
67 

68 
71 

72 
76 


69 
71 

73 

77 
79 
85 


74 
77 
82 
88 
92 
97 
99 
104 


79 

85 

93 

95 

99 

102 

105 

107 


96 
100 
103 
105 
107 
110 
114 


105 
107 
109 
111 
113 
117 
121 


109 
111 

113 
115 
119 
123 




40 




41 

42 




43 




44 

45 




46 






47 






48 








49 








50 










51 










52 












53 












54 














55 














56 
















57 
















58 


















59 


















60 




















61 




















62 


















116 


63 


















117 


64 




















1?1 


65 




















Iftfi 


















1 









STANDARDS OF NUTRITION AND GROWTH 

The chief standards by which nutrition and growth are estimated are three: 
1. The relation of weight to height. 2. The annual gain in weight and 
height. 3. The general appearance of the child. All school children should be 
weighed at least every three months — September, December, March and June 
are the best months. Those who are much below the normal should be weighed 
at least once every month; better, every week. The height should be taken 
twice a year, at six months' interval; September and March are the best months, 
each being the beginning of the periods of most rapid growth. The relation of 
weight to height is the one which is of most value in determining condition. This 
relation is but little affected by race or country. These tables were prepared by 
Dr. Thomas D. Wood, of the Child Health Organization. 

249 



Eating for Health and Strength 

in the mother's milk than there is in the usual 
adult human diet, in fact, the proportion is much 
less than it is in the conventional meat diet. 

The most common blunder to be found in 
writings upon the nutrition of children is this 
over-emphasis upon the quantity of protein ; this 
frequently leads to the introduction of meat in 
the child's diet, from which it should either be 
omitted entirely or used most sparingly. The 
proper quality and quantity of protein is vital, 
otherwise no growth can occur, but the un- 
natural efforts to build the whole diet around 
protein foods is a grievous mistake. 

This blunder of the excessive use of proteins 
in the child's diet is due to a little knowledge but 
an incomplete understanding of food science. 
Much more frequent are the blunders due to 
utter ignorance; they include not only the over- 
use of meat, but the over-use of denatured cereal 
foods, sugar, pastries and, above all, candies and 
confections. Such dietetic errors result in the 
food deficiency which I have already discussed 
at length in other chapters of this book. But 
in the case of children an insufficient diet is more 
dangerous because of the necessity of growth, 
and also because the smaller body and more 
rapid vital processes of the child render it less 
capable of storing up the essential food ele- 

250 



The Feeding of Children 



merits for periods when they are absent from 
the diet. 

The child needs a variety of natural foods; it 
tires quickly of monotonous and prescribed diets. 
A child is usually told to eat what is set before 
him — hence if the child does not like the food 
set before him he does not eat enough, or makes 
up the deficiency in quantity by a raid on the 
jam pots or a trip to the candy store. A child 
has the right to say something regarding the 
selection and preparation of his food; many 
parents will resent this statement, on the ground 
that the child's ignorance renders him incapable 
of deciding such a matter. But a parent should 
remember that a child's appetite is guided 
largely by instinct which is controlled entirely, 
if the child be normal, by the needs of its body. 
Therefore, the child's own appetite should guide 
the parent as to its needs. The parent should 
by all means select the child's food and try to 
train him in his dislikes and likes if his appetite 
seems abnormal, but the child's instinctive desire 
should guide in the matter — it should not be 
forced to eat food that is distasteful. Too 
often he will go hungry if you insist on his 
eating food he does not like. One can err either 
by acceding to the child's acquired taste for a 
few deficient foods, or by attempting to force 

251 



Eating for Health and Strength 

the child to eat foods for which he has no 
appetite. The problem is one that requires tact 
and patience as well as intelligence. The solu- 
tion may usually be found in the use of menus 
that offer a goodly number of natural and 
wholesome foods, a sufficient proportion of which 
the child has learned to eat with relish. 

There are a few foods, of course, which are 
so basically important that they cannot be 
omitted from the diet. First among these is 
milk and the simple rule is that every child 
should have as much as it desires of whole milk; 
it is his chief dependence for the growth protein, 
the calcium for bone formation and the pro- 
tective vitamines, though be sure to remember 
that milk is not needed with full hearty meals in 
which a large variety of wholesome food has 
been furnished. Use milk only with "light* ' 
meals, composed preferably of sweet fruit?. 

The leafy vegetables are not so important to 
the child as they are to the adult; they should 
not however be neglected in the child's diet. 
The practice of giving children well cooked spin- 
ach as soon as they are able to masticate it well 
has been widely adopted and with excellent 
results in the case of such children being below 
their normal nutritive condition. The spinach 
should be steamed rather than cooked since it 

252 . 



The Feeding of Children 



loses less mineral salts in steaming. Feeding 
spinach juice may be begun at the age of one 
year if the child is not thriving. A tablespoon - 
f ul a day may be given at this age and the amount 
may be gradually increased if the child learns to 
like it. Oranges or other acid fruit should be 
given daily. 

Tender salads with simple dressings should 
be added to the diet. Cooked greens, especially 
cooked cabbage, are not so digestible and should 
come later, though raw cabbage can be especially 
commended. 

Fruit, as well as vegetables should be plenti- 
fully used in the child's diet. Prune pulp and 
apple sauce may be added at quite an early age. 
As soon as the child has learned to chew his food 
carefully the sweet fruits, preferably raisins, may 
be freely given him and should be used to replace 
the store candies. Nuts which require very thor- 
ough mastication, and are not so easy of diges- 
tion, should be added to the diet gradually, from 
the fifth to the tenth year. 

The chief reliance for much of the fuel foods 
for the child must necessarily be the natural 
cereals, but they should not be used to the 
exclusion of fruits and vegetables. 

In the feeding of children the first thought 
to keep in mind is the necessity of confining the 

253 



Eating fox Health and Strength 

meals to three per day. By all means avoid the 
baneful practice of "piecing" between meals. 
That is one of the principal causes of children's 
ailments. The stomach is supposed to have its 
regular rest and when it starts to digest it 
should be allowed to continue the process with- 
out having additional food introduced in the 
"middle" of the digestive process. 

There is only one exception to this rule, 
and that refers to acid fruits. Acid fruits 
like oranges, apples, pears, pineapples, peaches, 
etc., can be taken at most any time when the 
child desires them, in moderate quantities. The 
desire for these fruits, shortly after a meal, fre- 
quently indicates the need of additional acid to 
help digest the meal. Therefore you can safely 
follow the instincts of a child in its desire for 
acid fruits, though I cannot emphasize too 
strongly the necessity of avoiding all other food 
between meals. 

The habit of giving children candies, cakes 
and delicacies of various kinds between meals 
should be most strongly condemned. A child 
cannot possibly maintain health where the "piec- 
ing" habit is adhered to unless he possesses 
extraordinary vital vigor. If parents would 
definitely understand that by feeding children 
between meals they are more liable to contract 

254 



The Feeding of Children 



measles, diphtheria, scarlet fever and many other 
serious diseases, they will perhaps best realize 
the danger of eating between meals. 

As soon as a child arrives at an age when he 
depends upon solid food, three meals a day 
should be sufficient for him and at such meals 
a child's appetite can usually be depended upon 
as far as quantity is concerned. A child can be 
allowed to satisfy its appetite at each of these 
meals with plain, wholesome food only. 

The appetite should not be "tickled" and a 
child should not be encouraged to eat beyond 
its appetite. Many parents are inclined to 
worry if a child seems to lose its appetite. This 
should cause no concern whatsoever, for if the 
dictates of the stomach are adhered to, it will 
come back to its "feed" within a reasonable 
time. 

One of my usual practices, when a child loses 
its appetite for a few days, is to feed nothing 
but acid fruit for a day or two. After this, as 
a rule, a child will keenly enjoy solid foods. 

A still better plan in many cases, after a 
child has seemed to have lost its appetite for a 
few days, is to put the child on an exclusive 
milk diet, giving it nothing but whole, sweet 
milk. In this case, a child should be given milk 
about every hour during the day and allowed 

255 



Eating for Health and Strength 

to take whatever it may desire at this time. 
If occasionally the period is stretched to one 
and a half or two hours, this will be satisfactory. 
In fact, there is no necessity of adhering rigidly 
to the every hour idea throughout the entire 
day. The child can be allowed to take as much 
milk as it may desire under these circumstances, 
though it should be allowed nothing else except 
acid fruit in connection therewith. No other 
food of any kind should be given with this diet. 

Many parents are impressed with the idea 
that a child cannot be thoroughly nourished on 
milk. This is a serious mistake as milk with no 
other food will nourish a child indefinitely. In 
fact, a rest now and then for the stomach from 
solid food, with a milk diet, is usually valuable 
to a child, and adults can also be benefited by a 
similar regime. 

I have known many instances where children 
have been able to gain weight and strength 
from a milk diet. In fact, in many instances 
in which a child does not seem to grow satisfac- 
torily, if a milk diet is given for three or four 
days, about twice a month, there will usually 
be a very material gain resulting therefrom. 

The diets presented herewith are merely sug- 
gestions. They can be varied in accordance 
with the needs. 

256 



The Feeding of Children 



MENUS 

DIET FROM THE TIME THE CHILD IS WEANED UP TO ABOUT 
TWO YEARS OF AGE 

Breakfast 

Half or whole orange or some other acid fruit that is 
enjoyed. 

Whenever the bowels are very loose this acid fruit should 
not be used. When constipated part of the white pulp 
of an orange, prunes or raisins are advised. 

Choice of the following cereals: crumbles, hominy, rice, 
oatmeal, corn-meal. 

The cereal can be served as a drink by making it into 
a very thin gruel, though it should be made with milk and 
eaten with a spoon like soup. It can be sweetened with 
brown sugar, if desired, though honey or raisins make a 
much more satisfactory sweetening. 

Dinner 

Choice of any one of the following foods: 

Vegetable soup. One egg prepared in any manner, 
frying excepted. Chopped beef, as in a Salisbury steak, 
if meat is desired. 

With any one of the above foods you can add graham 
bread, zwieback or whole wheat crackers and baked, boiled 
or mashed potatoes, with rice. 

A dessert can be made of rice, farina, tapioca, custard, 
etc. 

Supper 

Corn-meal and milk or some other cereal that might be 
palatable. If a child is very active and is hungry, one 
egg can be added. 

Whole wheat bread, corn bread or zwieback. 

If a child does not seem to be thoroughly nourished on 
a diet of this kind, a glass of milk could be given before 
retiring and one hour before each meal, if there is a desire 
for it. 

257 



Eating for Health and Strength 



DIET TWO TO SIX YEARS 

Breakfast 

Acid fruit as may be desired. 

Choice of cereals. Crumbles, shredded wheat, cornflakes, 
oatmeal, corn-meal, etc. 

Dinner 

Rich cream soup of some sort, made of vegetables. 
Beans, peas, barley, etc. 

Eggs cooked as desired. Meat, fish or chicken if meat 
is desired. Chopped beef (top of round steak) is usually 
the most wholesome and most nourishing kind of meat. 

Choice of any vegetable that is especially palatable. 
Potatoes, carrots, onions, spinach, asparagus, etc. 

A dessert can be made of any plain pudding like un- 
polished rice; custard, blanc-mange or pies can be used 
made with whole wheat crust. 

Candy can be allowed for dessert occasionally or raisins, 
prunes, dates or any sweet fruit will be more satisfactory. 

Supper 
Soup if desired. 

Eggs prepared in any way that may be appetizing. 
Cereal pudding of some sort, — rice, farina, corn-meal, 
etc., or stewed fruit. 

DIET FOR SIX YEARS AND OVER 

Breakfast 

Raw acid fruits as desired or stewed fruits. Choice of 
cereals, shredded wheat, crumbles, oatmeal, corn-meal, etc. 
Served with raisins, dates, figs or other sweet fruit instead 
of sugar. 

Dinner 

Any kind of nourishing, appetizing soup. 
Eggs prepared in any appetizing manner. 
Fish or chicken or meat, if meat is desired. 
All vegetables in season. 

258 



The Feeding of Children 



Salads are especially important in a child's diet as it 
becomes less active muscularly. Lettuce, tomatoes, cab- 
bage and all sorts of green "stuff" can be made into 
palatable salads. 

Desserts can consist of puddings or pies which can be 
made with whole wheat crust, or cakes containing a small 
amount of whole wheat flour or bran. 

Stewed fruit or custard. 

Supper 

Baked apples or other stewed fruit. 

Eggs in any form desired. 

Vegetables with whole wheat bread and butter. 

Milk or cocoa and some light dessert, if desired. 



259 



CHAPTER XIX 

Eating to Prevent or Cure Disease 

I^R. WILEY wrote some years ago that the 
^ J ^ medicine of the future would be foods, not 
drugs. This prediction has already been partly 
realized. Many works have been published of 
recent years on the subject of preventing and 
curing diseases by dietetic means. The medical 
profession is slow to give up the use — or per- 
haps I should say the over -use — of drugs, be- 
cause their reputed knowledge of the potency 
of pills is their chief hold on the mind of the 
fee-paying public. None the less, be it said to 
their credit, the medical fraternity is rapidly 
turning its attention to more rational and more 
natural means of healing, among which the 
proper diet ranks very high. Particularly is this 
true of publicly paid physicians employed in 
various health departments. These men, not 
dependent on fees and not required to give medi- 
cine to people not requiring it, are being rapidly 
weaned from the medical superstitions of the 
past, and are becoming advocates of rational 
health measures and disease prevention. The 

260 



Eating to Prevent or Cure Disease 

World War undoubtedly had an important in- 
fluence in turning scientific and medical men 
toward food problems. 

To speak of some of the particular cases, 
we have the investigations of deficiency diseases, 
which were discussed in Chapter IV. We find 
also tuberculosis is now considered to be very 
largely caused by improper nutrition. Dia- 
betes, long known to be a nutritional disease, 
has recently been brought under more rational 
treatment. Formerly doctors were content 
merely to exclude sugar and starch from the 
diet of the diabetic, permitting him to eat freely 
of other foods. Since diabetes is caused by a 
leakage from the kidneys of sugar from the 
blood, and since the blood must always contain 
sugar, or life could not exist, it did little good 
to exclude sugar from the diet. The method 
now adopted is that of a fast, followed by a 
diet carefully restricted as to quantity as well 
as to quality. 

Other illustrations could be cited of the adop- 
tion of dietetic methods in the treatment of 
specific diseases. The subject, however, is too 
large a one to be gone into in this chapter. I 
will, therefore, confine my further discussion 
here to the general relation of food to disease, 
and to the consideration of a few common ills 

261 



Eating for Health and Strength 

or roots of ills, in the prevention and curing of 
which the general reader may apply the prin- 
ciples of food science, without specific and indi- 
vidual prescriptions. 

First , let me say that while food and the con- 
dition of the body's nutrition can be shown to 
be the direct and sole cause of only a few 
diseases, yet any rational mind must realize that 
it is an indirect and contributing cause of all 
diseases. There are very few diseases that are 
truly epidemic and sweep through a popula- 
tion, afflicting all alike. Those who have the 
highest vitality and whose bodies are the best 
nourished, and free from either nutritional de- 
ficiencies or excesses, are the least likely to suc- 
cumb to disease, whatever be its immediate 
cause. This question of the resistance to disease 
which varies so widely in individual cases must 
rest upon the matter of individual physical effi- 
ciency. As the general laws of health, includ- 
ing those of nutrition, become fully understood 
and universally applied, diseases will disappear 
and disease germs will die a natural death. 
Those who follow the general dietetic laws 
taught in this book will decrease their suscepti- 
bility to disease to well nigh the vanishing point. 

The diseases which are both common and 
which are most directly connected with food 

262 



Eating to Prevent or Cure Disease 



problems, and are most certainly prevented or 
cured by correct eating, are as follows: First: 
Digestive disorders. Second: Diseases asso- 
ciated with under-weight and under-nutrition — 
tuberculosis comes in this class as do many nerv- 
ous afflictions. Third: Diseases associated with 
over-eating and obesity. This group includes 
diabetes, cirrhosis of the liver — and for that 
matter practically all diseases connected with the 
kidneys and liver. Apoplexy, gout and many 
forms of heart disease are also associated with 
obesity, and are presumably caused by the over- 
eating which causes the obesity. 

Obviously the way to prevent diseases, or to 
cure them if they already exist, when the dis- 
eases are caused by or associated with malnutri- 
tion or obesity, is to avoid or cure the malnutri- 
tion or obesity. In other words if the body 
weight is made right and kept right, the disease 
cannot appear, or if the correction is not made 
too late, will disappear. 

In the more immediate matter of digestive 
disorders, the correction of the diet as the means 
of relief is too obvious to need argument. There 
are thousands of tons of drugs taken to cure 
stomach troubles, while the cause which is the use 
of indigestible foods or excessive food quanti- 
ties, fails to be corrected. The one sure cure 

263 



Eating tor Health and Strength 

for indigestion is to quit eating. This may 
sound like a humorous statement; nevertheless 
it should be taken seriously. When a man 
breaks down from over-work, he obviously needs 
a rest. The same is true of the over-worked 
stomach. If a man is dependent on his liveli- 
hood, he cannot rest too long without being in 
danger of starvation, and so also, the stomach 
cannot take an indefinite rest without the same 
effect upon its owner. But the overworked 
stomach can be given a brief rest (from one to 
seven days) and this is frequently all that is 
needed to effect a cure. 

All stomachs do not get out of order from 
the same causes; the excessive use of certain 
foods, or certain badly prepared foods or bad 
food combinations may be the cause of the par- 
ticular trouble. It is up to the intelligence of 
the individual, with or without professional 
advice, to find the trouble and eliminate the 
cause. No general rules can be given here that 
will apply in all cases, other than the general 
rules for proper eating as are given elsewhere 
in this book. These general rules, however, 
will eliminate nine-tenths of digestive disorders, 
because nine-tenths, yes, ninety-nine per cent are 
caused by dietetic errors. These errors are as- 
sociated with over-eating and the use of over- 

264 



Eating to Prevent or Cure Disease 

seasoned, over-complicated and over-cooked 
foods. Hence the general remedy is to return 
to a natural diet. In case of digestive dis- 
order such a natural diet is rarely more impera- 
tive than for those whose digestive apparatus 
has stood up under the strain and can handle 
anything offered, passing the trouble on to the 
liver, kidneys, heart and nerves. 

The use of very simple diets often work won- 
ders with chronic cases of indigestion. The 
milk diet is one such simple procedure, and it is 
well worth trying for those who suffer from 
stomach trouble, especially when this trouble is 
associated with under-weight, loss of sleep and 
a general case of "nerves." Another form of 
diet, often of high curative value, is one consist- 
ing almost wholly of uncooked foods. This 
does not mean that one should eat raw meat, or 
raw pie-dough, but that one should omit all 
such foods as seem to need cooking, and con- 
fine the diet to the milk group, nuts, fruits and 
tender vegetables, that may be and should be 
eaten uncooked. 

Another disease, and one that has been called 
the mother of diseases, is constipation. This 
disorder, with which the majority of civilized 
people are afflicted, is usually caused by wrong 
eating. Taking drugs for this, while continu- 

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Eating for Health and Strength 

ing the eating habits that cause it, is a stupid 
and a dangerous procedure which offers no 
permanent relief. The proper regulation of the 
bowel action is a matter which every individual 
should attend to as he does to the matter of 
external bodily cleanliness, and of these two 
affairs of personal hygiene the former is of the 
greater importance. Dirt upon the skin is un- 
sightly but it is rarely poisonous; a congested 
intestine is a constant source of body poisoning. 
The rate of the passage of the food and food 
residues through the alimentary canal depends 
on the bulk or quantity of indigestible fibre. 
Each species of animal has a digestive tract of a 
size fitted to deal with the natural food of the 
species. The herbivorous animals have volumi- 
nous digestive organs; the carnivorous animals 
have relatively small intestines. Man ranks 
midway between these two groups, as his natural 
diet is of less bulk and contains less fibre than 
does that of the cow, but more than that of the 
lion. When the food quantity is restricted, 
because of man's lessened activity through civili- 
zation, and all fibre is eliminated from the diet, 
the result is that the intestines have not a suffi- 
cient bulk of material to deal with, and the food 
waste does not pass from the body with suffi- 
cient promptness. The result is that the waste, 

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Eating to Prevent or Cure Disease 

together with poisonous products of decay and 
fermentation, is reabsorbed. 

Various artificial means have been resorted to 
to overcome this difficulty. The worst and the 
most commonly used is the purgative or laxa- 
tive drug. Such drugs, no matter how much 
they are camouflaged with "candy" or adver- 
tised as harmless, are poisons which irritate the 
intestines, thus bringing about an artificial 
diarrhea in a natural effort to eliminate them. 
The remedy may be quite as bad as the disease, 
and never effects a real cure. 

The natural laxative is, of course, the cellu- 
lose fibre of natural foods; two other substances 
are now used as substitutes which depend upon 
their mechanical and not their chemical action. 
One of these is Agar, which is a gelatinous form 
of cellulose made from seaweed; the other is 
mineral oil which is wholly insoluble and has no 
chemical action but merely acts as a mechanical 
lubricant. These materials, though bought in 
drug stores, are not "drugs," but merely artificial 
substitutes for the natural cellulose of food and 
therefore do little or no harm, and often much 
good may come from their use, though one 
should strive at all times to follow a diet that 
will insure regular bowel activity. 

Another remedy for constipation is the in- 
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Eating for Health and Strength 

ternal bath or injection of water into the colon; 
this is an immediately effective remedy and 
should be used when there is need of immediate 
relief. It should not be necessary, however, 
as a permanent habit, but may be used in emer- 
gencies and while one is bringing about a per- 
manent relief and restoring normal intestinal 
action by the proper diet. 

A sufficient quantity of bulky fibre in the 
food is the ideal and only permanent method of 
establishing and maintaining proper intestinal 
action; the proportion of such fibre needed will 
vary somewhat with the individual, and his past 
eating habits, as well as with his general muscu- 
lar vigor and physical activity. The substitu- 
tion of "live" vital food, such as whole wheat 
bread instead of white-flour bread is frequently 
all that is needed to obtain permanent relief. The 
use of leafy or fibrous vegetable and pulpy or fi- 
brous fruits is equally valuable if they are used in 
sufficient quantities; prunes and raisins are both 
excellent. ( Oranges with the yellow covering 
rubbed or peeled off, leaving the white substances, 
can often be used to great advantage. Eat white 
part of peeling with the pulp of the oranges be- 
fore breakfast in the morning. 



CHAPTER XX 

The Diet in Old Age 

HP HE average man does not concern himself 
with the question of how long he is to live 
until he begins to grow old. I, therefore, have 
entitled this chapter "The Diet in Old Age"; 
but it might better be called "the diet to pre- 
vent old age," or "the diet to increase the length 
of life." 

There is really little distinction between the 
ideal diet for old age and the ideal diet for any 
other period of life. The ideal diet will increase 
the length of life, and the earlier in life it is 
adopted, and the more consistently it is fol- 
lowed, the greater will be the increase in the 
count of years. Too often it is only when most 
of life is past that we begin to value it, and 
hence are the more concerned with its extension, 
and the more keen in search of methods of eat- 
ing that will prolong the years that remain. 

If you will read a considerable number of 
accounts of the habits of living of men who have 
achieved the distinction of unusual years and a 
vigorous and hearty old age, you will find 

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Eating for Health and Strength 

numerous reasons set down in explanation of 
the unusual longevity. In some instances the 
chief credit will be given to systems of physical 
exercise; in some cases, to habits of thought; 
in others to hours of sleep or an out-door en- 
vironment; while, on the other hand, you will 
find the abstinence from some particular vice — 
or even the addiction to some vice, or the use 
of some drug (witness the advertisement of 
Duffy's Pure Malt Whiskey) set down as 
the cause of longevity. But in all creditable 
accounts of longevity you will find running 
through them one element of uniformity: in- 
variably those who live to unusual years have 
practised abstemious habits of eating. Cornaro, 
the -Italian philosopher, who lived several cen- 
turies ago, attained the age of 101; when in his 
nineties he wrote a book on longevity, in which 
he ascribed his unusual age and vigor to his 
spare diet. He has been misquoted as saying 
that "he lived upon one egg a day"; this, of 
course, referred only to the use of the single 
egg in place of meat, but his diet was very 
simple in quality and very spare in quantity. 

In 1635 a certain very old man named 
Thomas Parr visited King Charles. Mr. Parr 
informed the king that he (Parr, not the king) 
lived on cheese, milk, a little coarse bread and 

270 



The Diet in Old Age 



sour whey. Mr. Parr laid claim to 153 years. 
He may have falsified about his age, though he 
may have told the truth about his diet. 

These stories of those who lived a century 
or more are always interesting, but they are not 
so convincing, at least to the scientific mind, as 
are the statistics of the insurance companies to 
which reference has been made in our chapter 
on obesity. The insurance people have no data 
of the diet of the policy-holders, but they do 
have records of their weights, and the relation 
of the weight to the quantity of food eaten is 
an absolute and positive one. Fat men cannot 
be light eaters and thin men cannot be heavy 
eaters, except in abnormal cases. Insurance 
statistics show that over-weight, and hence over- 
eating increases the death rate, and this increase 
is specially marked around the age of forty. 
Such increase in the death rate diminishes some- 
what with further advancing age, but at the 
age of sixty, the death rate for the fattest group 
of men was about seventy per cent greater than 
for the group of the slenderest men of the same 
age period. 

We have no insurance data for men beyond 
this age group, as too few men are insured after 
that age to secure reliable statistics. But the 
facts we have certainly offer very convincing 

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Eating for Health and Strength 

proof that fat men do not live as long as those 
of spare frame. Practical observation among 
the old people you know will convince you of 
the same fact. Fat old men are very rare, and 
those who are fat will usually be found to have 
acquired the condition late in life. Men who 
have been fat all their lives rarely live beyond 
the fifties or sixties. It is those with spare 
frames, and hence abstemious eaters, whom you 
will find still living in the eighties and nineties. 

It did not seem difficult to explain these facts. 
We simply knew that a light eater who main- 
tained a spare and wiry figure outlived the 
heavy eater whose form was burdened with fat. 
Obesity burdens the body and prevents proper 
activity; over-eating fills the body with surplus 
food wastes which generate poisons and overtax 
the excretory organs; moreover, over-eating and 
obesity cause, or at least, render one more sus- 
ceptible to various diseases. These facts alone 
might seem sufficient to explain the greater 
longevity of the abstemious eater. 

However, I believe that we have found an 
additional explanation in the discoveries that 
have recently been made concerning the general 
physiological effects of a light versus the heavy 
diet. The light eater does not live so fast, hence 
he lives longer. This statement is literally true, 

272 



The Diet in Old Age 



and the word "fast" is not necessarily used as 
a synonym for immorality. The restricted diet 
of Dr. Benedict's experiments resulted in an 
actual slowing down of the rate of the heart 
beat; this decrease was in fact about thirty per 
cent. If we assume that a man comes into this 
world like a wound-up clock, capable of so many 
ticks, it seems quite logical that if he ticked fast 
he would not tick as long — this is an unusual 
viewpoint, but it may be a great truth that we 
are only just discovering. 

We are accustomed to measuring life in years, 
that is, the number of times the earth goes round 
the sun, which has nothing in particular to do 
with the life processes. Measuring life in the 
number of heart beats would certainly be more 
logical. The over-eater who is fat, who pants, 
is short of breath, who has a high pulse rate and 
a high blood pressure, is physiologically running 
too fast, and hence will run down too quickly. 
The light eater who is spare of frame, who has 
a slow pulse rate and a low blood pressure, is 
living more slowly and will hence live longer. 
Incidentally he has more reserve power for 
emergencies. Sudden exertion increases the rate 
of the heart beat, but if it is already beating 
rapidly due to the burden of digesting and 
eliminating surplus food, then it has not as 

273 



Eating for Health and Strength 

much opportunity left for increase from the 
legitimate stimulation of exercise. Hence the 
fat man, when he becomes excited and runs a 
block, tumbles down with heart disease or breaks 
a blood vessel and dies from apoplexy. 

The doctor's certificate rarely sets down "old 
age" as the cause of death. The majority of 
those deaths which occur in late middle life are 
from diseases plainly related to incorrect living 
and chiefly to over-eating. It is such deaths 
that take off a man before his time and shorten 
life. The way to prevent this is to avoid the 
cause. 

In old age the general activities of the body 
are decreased. Old people move more slowly 
and work less vigorously than the young, and, 
unless special pains have been made to main- 
tain them, the bulk of the muscles materially 
decrease. All these facts contribute to the 
reduction of the amount of food needed to main- 
tain life; hence even though the diet has been 
correctly proportioned in youth, as age ad- 
vances it should be decreased. If over-eating 
has been practised in youth and middle life the 
need of such decrease is much greater. 

The nature of the food and the quality of 
the diet need not be changed. There is less 
need of energy-producing foods, but there is 

274 



The Diet in Old Age 



also less need of other food elements as all the 
life processes have been checked in speed and 
the volume of muscles has usually been de- 
creased. The mineral salts, vitamines and avail- 
able proteins are still essential; the fat, sugars, 
and starches which furnish the fuel energy are 
also required, but in reduced quantities. 

In some cases the loss of natural teeth will 
render mastication a little more difficult, and 
hence require the adoption of foods more easily 
masticated. Resort should not be had, however, 
to excess of starchy porridges, as there are plenty 
of natural foods that may be eaten without 
laborious chewing. The adoption of the method 
previously described in "eating" milk or that used 
in Horace Fletcher's habit of holding foods, even 
liquids like milk and soup, in the mouth and 
working them about until they are mixed with 
saliva and swallowed instinctively is to be recom- 
mended for those who are not able to chew hard 
foods. 

With the wear of years, especially if wrong 
eating habits have been followed, the digestive 
powers may become somewhat weakened. The 
exact nature of the impairment of digestion 
varies with the, individual, and hence cannot be 
met by any general rules or remedies. There 
are some foods, however, that are so readily 

275 



Eating for Health and Strength 

digested that they may be used by almost any 
one, no matter how enfeebled the digestion may 
be. Milk and eggs rank very high in this re- 
spect; hence find a large place in the diet of 
those of weakened digestive powers. Very ripe 
pulpy fruits may be added to such a list. 

I will not, however, prolong these suggestions, 
for normally there is no occasion for the man 
or woman of advanced years to be on the invalid 
list. The pampering and coddling of people 
merely because they have reached a certain num- 
ber of years is a fault too often committed by 
the children or others with whom they may have 
the ill fortune to live. It is often said that a 
man is as old as he feels, and the younger gen- 
eration is prone to make him feel as old as he 
is, and then some. 

On the whole I may say that there are no 
special dietetic laws for old age that do not 
apply to adult life in general. It is a question 
always of eating foods that supply all the ele- 
ments of nourishment that the body requires 
and of eating them in sufficient quantity to main- 
tain the body in a wiry, muscular condition. Eat 
to keep thin as the years advance, and your days 
upon this earth will be many. 

the end 

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U Aft 



